‘Mountain of wood on fire’

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This article was published 07/04/2022 (1290 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Just a few more days were needed for the oldest grain elevator in Canada to be fully salvaged.

But plans changed Tuesday when the Lake of the Woods Milling Company elevator in Elva, Man., was razed by what began as a single errant ember.

Troy Angus, the owner of The Den Authentic Barnwood, watched as the grain elevator he bought in 2021 — with the intent to reclaim its 125-year-old material — disappeared into an inferno.

“We’re taking responsibility for everything,” Angus said. “We did it, and it wasn’t intentional, but thankfully we were right there when everything went south, and we were able to act as fast as possible and in a safe manner.”

Angus and his crew were managing a controlled burn of rotten, unsalvageable wood on the property that day. The workers didn’t think the fire could spread to the elevator — the scrap sat in a wet slough, and the wind was blowing in the opposite direction.

During the last hour of the workday, the wind shifted and blew a spark into an opening “the size of a football” at the roof line of the 40-foot-tall elevator.

“It was an orange glow. At first, when I looked at it, it didn’t register,” Angus said. “I thought it was an orange flag. On my second look, I knew exactly what it was.”

Within minutes, the whole elevator — made of Douglas fir — was engulfed. One of Angus’ crew members hopped into an excavator and tipped the building over in an attempt to contain the flames.

“The heat was extreme,” Angus said. “It was just a mountain of wood on fire… it reminded me almost of volcanic ash.”

The situation was under control by the time firefighters arrived on the scene. But, within an hour, the building was gone. Angus and his crew stayed on site until 2:30 a.m. to ensure the fire didn’t reignite.

They were just days away from beginning the fourth phase of a five-phase project to deconstruct the elevator. (Videos of each stage of the process can be found on The Den Authentic Barnwood’s YouTube Channel.)

“We were so close to saving this wood and, ironically, it burnt anyways,” Angus said. “It’s so sad.”

The project wasn’t a total loss, Agnus said. They were able to salvage 90 per cent of the elevator’s tin cladding, as well as all of the antique flywheels, hinges and door handles.

Angus had planned to level the Lake of the Woods Milling Company elevator, and a second elevator, on Monday. Roughly the distance of two city blocks away from the burn site sits the United Grain Growers elevator. This elevator, built circa 1916, is also in the fourth phase of Angus’ deconstruction project — a second chance.

“We can still go forward with the project,” Angus said.

Gordon Goldsborough, the president of the Manitoba Historical Society, commended Angus’ dedication to salvaging these grain elevators.

In 2021, nine grain elevators were demolished in Manitoba, Goldsborough said. The historian estimates the majority of these structures’ materials were likely “trucked to the landfill.”

Elevators are “one of the last reminders of how agriculture used to be done on the Prairies,” Goldsborough said. “Elevators are still used, but the scale has completely changed. That one at Elva was 25,000 bushels… The largest grain elevator in Manitoba, presently, is about 1.5 million bushels.”

The burned elevator was what’s known as a wooden, crib-style elevator, Goldsborough said. It was built by stacking boards on top of each other, face-to-face, and attaching them with thousands of nails.

“It creates a very thick wall that is very strong,” Goldsborough said.

The Western Canada Flour Mills Grain Elevator at the Manitoba Agricultural Museum near Austin is now the oldest grain elevator in the province; it was built in 1901.

fpcity@freepress.mb.ca