UPDATE: Cranbrook’s Fire Department will be monitoring the Kootenay Springs Building throughout the day following an early morning fire Thursday.
Fire Chief Scott Driver says a warming fire was started inside the building on 6th Street North which fire crews were able to extinguish.
“We had a really difficult time accessing the building due to the way it has been boarded up with steel,” Driver says. “We worked our way into the building and discovered there was a warming fire not too far inside the building. We were safely able to extinguish it, but it did take quite a bit of effort to gain access and to be able to enter the building safely.”
Driver says this is the second fire at this location in the past few years, with an earlier fire happening at the property in 2020.
“Its the same location, but in a different building. There are technically two different buildings side-by-side,” Driver says. “Both are non-combustible construction, so the outside shell of the buildings remain unchanged, but on the inside of the building that was burning today, its a heavy timber building and its in quite a state of disrepair.”
Driver says fire crews will revisit the site throughout the day to make sure there’s no remaining fire in the building.
A section of 6th Street North between the Strip and the railway tracks was closed temporarily early Thursday morning while fire crews dealt with the blaze.
The original social media post from Cranbrook Fire about the incident can be found below.
– Cranbrook Fire Chief Scott Driver
C Shift has called in all staff to help fight a stubborn fire located in the Kootenay Springs building this morning. There will be traffic disruptions on 6th St N. this morning. pic.twitter.com/IDecEMXCpk
— cranbrookfire (@cranbrookfire) March 23, 2023
Comments