It's hard enough for these parents of five children, with another on the way, to find $650 for rent each month. It was even harder to explain Friday afternoon to their two-year-old daughter Channelle that the flames she was seeing on her birthday weren't her cake candles.
Around 3 p.m., Frank and Lois Fraser watched firefighters battle a blaze as it devastated their three-storey rental home at 149 Sherbrook St. They were celebrating their daughter Channelle's second birthday when one of her teen sisters smelled smoke and alerted her parents, who escaped from the building.
Winnipeg firefighters battle a stubborn house in the 100 block of Sherbrook this afternoon. There were no injuries.
"We were going to save the cake for later on," said Lois Fraser, 36, who is six months pregnant.
"It didn't work out that way."Alongside her stood Frank Fraser, 27, who lives in the home with Frank Jr., 3, Amber Olsen, 13, Brandy Olsen, 14 and Matthew Olsen, 15. One of the family's pets -- a large turtle -- was rescued by firefighters, and a tiny black cat was carried out of the home.
The couple was unsure where they would sleep Friday night, and said they had no content insurance and no local family members to contact.
"I'm still overwhelmed... I don't know where we're going to stay," Lois Fraser said.
"It's too much. I have personal things, I've got my mother's ashes in there... I don't care about the house, I care about the things that were in it. The house can be rebuilt."
"Everything I own is in that house, and it's all gone," Frank Fraser added.
Winnipeg Fire Department Platoon Chief Gary Rasmussen said the cause of the fire was unknown, but that water damage wrecked much of the property.
The landlord of the property, who also owns neighbouring 151 Sherbrook St., said he did not have extensive building insurance.
gabrielle.giroday@freepress.mb.ca
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