EAGLE VALLEY
NEWS
Roundabout gets good reception from residents Page 2
Public able to monitor Malakwa Bridge project Page 7
Wednesday, May 13, 2015 PM40008236
Vol. 60 No. 19 Sicamous, B.C., • 1.25 (GST included) • www.eaglevalleynews.com
Attack: Firefighters from Sicamous, Malakwa and Swansea Point work to control last Wednesday morning’s fire at Extreme Power Sports.
Photo by Kelly M. Dick
Business owner plans to rebuild after devastating blaze By Lachlan Labere Eagle Valley News
Jason Stutzke says he was driving through Saskatchewan last Wednesday when he received a text message that made him sick. The message included a photo of a building at night, his building, engulfed in flame. “I got a text with a picture at 2:30, threeo-clock in the morning of a building in flames and I’ve got tenants up there,” said Stutzke. “All I cared about was did they got out alive?” Sicamous Fire Chief Brett Ogino said the tenants were awake when the fire occurred and were able to get out unharmed. The building itself, however, and everything within, including Stutzke’s business, Extreme Power Sports, was destroyed in the fire that occurred at approximately 12:30 a.m. on May 6. “I lost everything, not only business stuff – I had a house and half of my personal contents in that building that I lost. Everything to my name,” a distressed Stutzke told the News by telephone from Winnipeg later that day. He said he was in the process of picking up his Mustang show car, to deliver to California for auction, when he received news of the fire.
building, and quickly spread through the roof. With no one inside the structure, firefighters battled the blaze from the outside with multiple hoses on the ground, and the Sicamous department’s ladder truck nailing the flames from above. Ogino said he was concerned the building’s metal awning might come down during the fight. A section of it did, but later in the morning when no one was nearby. The fire has not been deemed suspicious; however, given its size, Ogino requested the investigation be conducted by the Office of the Fire Commissioner. Sicamous RCMP Sgt. Scott West said police would also be involved if needed. Stutzke said he recently rented a home in Kelowna, where he runs another business, and had been in the process of moving his personal belongings there. Extreme Power Sports was closed for the summer, and Stutzke said he’d planned Investigation: Sgt. Scott West and Fire Chief Brett Ogino survey the damage to reopen in the fall. The building, he noted, was for sale, and a potential buyer was in the caused by the large commercial/residential fire. Photo by Lachlan Labere wings. However, Stutzke says the plan now is to rebuild. Approximately 32 firefighters, from the Trans-Canada Highway. They remained on “I have no choice… I was going to open Sicamous, Malakwa and Swansea Point fire the scene until about 6:30 a.m. in the fall again for the winter season. So, my departments responded to the blaze at StutzOgino said the fire appeared to begin in fingers are crossed that the building will be ke’s commercial/residential building on the the back garage-area of the cinder-block rebuilt by fall,” said Stutzke.