A driver is unharmed after his car caught fire on Ocean Ave. West and Canora Rd.
At approximately 8:00 p.m. on Mon., Nov. 6, North Saanich firefighters responded to a report of an early-2000s Chevrolet Cavalier sedan ablaze. The Sidney Fire Department arrived five minutes later.
Sidney resident Rob Prior was in the area at the time and reported to the News Review that the driver of the car “smelled something funny coming from his dash, pulled over to investigate, and fire erupted.”
Prior captured photos and video of the blaze.
“(The driver) was able to exit the vehicle with his belongings before it became fully engulfed,” Prior said in an email. His account was confirmed by Sidney’s deputy fire chief Mike Harmon.
The fire was technically in the Sidney Fire Department’s jurisdiction, but the fire occurred on the border between jurisdictions, and there was confusion at dispatch about what side of the border it was on. Harmon said he was glad to find his counterparts already at the scene because “at the end of the day we’re both there to do the same job.”
Harmon called it a “rather difficult fire” as fuel was leaking from a punctured gas tank, so foam was used to extinguish that fire. A tire also exploded due to the blaze. Both departments were on scene for about 90 minutes with four fire trucks, over 22 firefighters and several command vehicles between them.
The Sidney Fire Twitter account reported that traffic was closed in both directions for about an hour. The cause of the fire is still under investigation.
UPDATE: Ocean Ave closed in both directions until further notice. #yyj #yyjtraffic #sidney
— SidneyVFire (@SidneyVFire) November 7, 2017
With files from Steven Heywood
reporter@peninsulanewsreview.com
Like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter
