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Chipman hotel closed for past six weeks awaiting repairs

BY JANA SEMENIUK

As temperatures began dipping below -30 in early Dec., Dave Magee, owner of the Chipman Hotel, was feeling it more than most when his 85-year-old boiler stopped working.

Magee lives in his hotel and immediately contacted his insurance broker.

“It was the first Sunday in Dec. They said someone would be out the following Wed., and I was worried my pipes would freeze,” said Magee. “I plugged in a dozen space heaters but that obviously wasn’t enough to stop our Alberta weather from coming in. (The insurance company) had a couple of guys show up to disconnect my water supply. So, I was without water and heat.”

Magee said it was hard to keep warm with his space heaters until he got a hand from friend, Don McBride.

“He gave me a call to see if there's anything that he could do, and I kind of ran everything by him and the next day Don showed up at my back door with one of those jobsite heaters,” he said, adding that he had been trying to get one only to be told there were none available.

“Everyone told me forget it. So, Don showed up, (and) bless his heart I’ll always be grateful.”

Meanwhile, Magee has had to shut down his hotel. He said that McBride helped him get his water back temporarily but had to shut that back down when he realized that the glass sanitizer inside his dishwasher was frozen and his ice machine was not operational.

“I was worried there would be further damage,” he said. “I'll just

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