Large Fire In Lumby

Written by Glen Morrison 107.5 KISSFM Tuesday, 07 February 2012 03:59
Lumby fire crews are still on the scene of a commercial fire in the downtown.  Chief Tony Clayton says they were just returning from a call out when this was reported in the early evening, about 8:30. The blaze destroyed a laundromat and gift shop along with two  suites on the upper floor. At three this morning Clayton told KISS-FM "basically right now we've got heavy equipment just showed up and we'll be pulling the walls in, the building'll be a total loss, it's still burning pretty good, we just can't get to the fire  until we get the walls pulled in" Clayton says it's too soon to determine a cause, but fortunately there were no injuries. At the height of the blaze the Lumby crews were backed up by Lavington, Coldstream and BX Swan lake departments with up to 49 firefighters on the blaze.  Clayton says their air packs were freezing up and they had to rotate crews due to the cold weather. Due to the fire highway 6 has been closed in the block to the west of the village's 4 way stop at Shuswap Avenue. It'll likely remain closed until mid morning, detours are available.