‘I thought I would lose everything’: Wildfire evacuee and PAFD highlight importance of sprinkler systems

Signs of the recent wildfire are evident from Highway 55, east of Prince Albert. Scorched trees and blackened earth line the road.

“If you’re driving here, you don’t expect to see this,” Birch Lane resident Kobus Steyn said, gesturing to his home. “Everything is burnt … you come around the corner and it’s just your little house (and) it’s just perfect, untouched. It almost feels surreal.”

Steyn was sure he was “going to lose everything” when the Cloverdale Fire forced him and his wife to evacuate last week.

He credits the fact it’s still standing to the “total dedication” of the firefighters who protected it and the sprinkler systems they quickly set up on his roof.

“If you look right around my house, only this little patch that my house is on is not burnt, obviously because of the people soaking it with water with sprinklers,” he said.

Even after firefighters were ordered to evacuate so water bombers could drop retardant on the area, Steyn said some told him they stayed behind.

“Every time they were bombing they would just hide under my semi and then came out and continued the firefighting,” Steyn said.

Despite at least 75 households being evacuated because of the Cloverdale Fire, not a single home or major structure was lost to the blaze. The effective deployment of rooftop sprinkler systems was a large part of that success, explained Prince Albert Fire Department Chief Kris Olsen.

Olsen encouraged anyone living in a forested area to buy a home protection system, consisting of overlapping rooftop sprinklers and a high-pressure hose. He said the department would be “more than happy to assist” with the layout to ensure good coverage.

In the event of an emergency, having the systems already in place will save firefighters valuable time, Olsen said.

“We could utilize that time for water supply to protect other structures or work on a flank (of the fire), as an example,” he said.

Olsen could not immediately give an estimated cost of buying a home protection system.

— Story by paNOW’s Alison Sandstrom