A fire broke out Saturday at the Trot in Time residents in Garden Lots, resulting in the collapse of a barn used to store wagons. Photo - Submitted
A structure fire in Lunenburg leveled a wagon house on the Trot in Time Buggy Rides property Saturday, taking with it thousands of dollars of equipment.
Around 1:35 PM, Lunenburg Fire Department, along with Dayspring, Riverport, Blockhouse and Mahone Bay departments, responded to a fire call at the Garden Lots property. Upon arrival, firefighters found a barn used to store wagons and other equipment was fully engulfed in flames.
Corey Hodder, assistant deputy chief for the Lunenburg district fire department, said the fire spread quickly throughout the building, leaving everything inside it a total loss.
“We were on scene within 9 minutes, but by then it was so far gone,” he said,”The roof had already collapsed by the time we had arrived.”
Hodder said the fire broke out on a work bench where owner Basil Oickle had been working previously.
“as far as we know, its accidental,” he said.
“He went in to the house for some visitors who had stopped by and when he went back out, he noticed the fire on his workbench. He tried to remove one of his older carriages but it got stuck on the doorway on the way out.”
Lost along with the barn was thousands of dollars worth of equipment, two carriages, and a car belonging to an employee.
Oickle said while most of his property and business has insurance, the wagon house was not insured, leaving him with no help to replace the lost property.
“The sad part is, I pay nearly $15,000 a year for all the insurances I need to have in place,” he said, ” But I couldn’t afford no more, so I had no insurance on that building.”
He said he had been welding a pair of new horseshoes in the barn when he was visited by his son and granddaughter. He turned the torches off and headed inside with them, but when he came out shortly after, that’s when he noticed the fire.
None of the animals were harmed during the fire, as they were stored in another barn, and only Oickle received minor burns while trying to pull out a wagon.
He said as it stands right now, the future of Trot in Time is uncertain.
“I’ll try to keep it going for now, but honestly I think it’ll take a miracle.”
