A hangar fire at the Lacombe Regional Airport Sunday night destroyed three planes and caused roughly $1 million in damages but no one was hurt. (Ryan Leclerc)

By Sheldon Spackman

$1 million in damages

Three planes destroyed in hangar fire at Lacombe Regional Airport

Jul 8, 2019 | 11:10 AM

Investigators are looking into the cause of a fire Sunday night that destroyed a hangar at the Lacombe Regional Airport.

Jon Fromm with Lacombe Flying Club said on Facebook that no one was inside the hangar at the time of the fire and that no one was injured.

Three airplanes were lost in the blaze along with other objects, but the owner is said to have insurance.

“On behalf of the Lacombe Flying Club, I would like to thank the Lacombe and Blackfalds Fire Departments, Lacombe Police Service, and EMS for their prompt response and diligent efforts,” Fromm said on Facebook.

“Unfortunately, due to the nature of the fire, there was nothing that could be done to save the hangar or its contents, but the successful containment of the fire prevented it from spreading to other buildings.”

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Eric Graham, acting fire chief for the Lacombe Fire Department says the call came in around 7:30 p.m., with crews being met with heavy smoke and fire billowing from the front door of the hangar when they arrived.

“I guess it was probably a couple hours afterwards that we finally managed to sort of contain it and control the fire and start to extinguish it and make some progress on it,” explains Graham. “Fortunately, there was no other structures adjacent to the original hangar that were impacted.”

However, Graham admits a large amount of contents inside the hangar posed a challenge for the 24 firefighters who remained on scene until 1:30 a.m. Monday morning.

“It definitely made for a difficult fire load inside the hangar itself,” he exclaims. “It was a really hot fire, lots of vehicles, fuel tanks, stuff like that. The hangar was also constructed of a wood frame with tin cladding, so when it started to fail and fall down, the tin covered-up a lot of the hotspots, so it was a bit of a challenge to actually overhaul and dig through it and get the fire out.”

Damage is estimated excess of $1 million.