On June 6, The Shield Journal awarded the first of its 2022 bi-annual Community Safety Grants to the Rideau Lakes Fire Department (RLFD) after a catastrophic fire destroyed their station in Portland, Ont.
On Dec. 21, 2021, RLFD Chief Scott Granahan was at home when he received an alert in the late afternoon from the Fire Department’s paging system. The address on the alert was for their Portland station, just four doors down from his home.
“I’ve had quite a few calls during my time of station addresses popping up,” Granahan says. “A lot of the time people in small communities will drive to a fire hall for whatever their needs are, whether it’s medical or something else. When you see a call to a volunteer station, a lot of the time it’ll be a drive-up medical call.”
Unfortunately, that was not the case this time. Granahan was one of the first to arrive on scene as he was so close by, but the moment he stepped outside, he says he was taken aback by the magnitude of the blaze. “I didn’t really have a lot of time to process anything between getting the call and arriving to the station,” Granahan recalls. “It was definitely a little unnerving to step outside my door and see a fire of that size. It took me back a little bit, but then it was back to business.”
According to Granahan, the fire couldn’t have come at a worse time. He explains that getting people to respond to daytime calls can be challenging on a regular day, but since it was so close to the holidays, many of the volunteer firefighters on staff were already out of town. There was a neighbour on one side of the station who was home and unaware of the fire, so the first priority was to get him to safety. Then, the near-impossible task of getting such a massive blaze under control.
By the time everything was said and done, Granahan says the building was completely burnt to the ground. The damage was extensive; a pumper, a tanker, a rescue and all the associated equipment were lost in the fire. Worse still were the irreplaceable files, memorabilia and history that were lost, including records collected through years of amalgamation with various departments.
“To try to replace that history is impossible, so the crew has had to redirect that energy toward moving forward,” Granahan says. “They’re doing a great job at that.”
After the fire, the first step in moving forward was to get the Department operational again as soon as possible. Luckily, the RLFD had no shortage of community support. Fire Departments from surrounding townships including Leeds and Grenville and Northumberland County stepped up to help, offering essential trucks and equipment that allowed them to be back up and running in a matter of hours. Granahan was also able to house some equipment at his own residence, since it was so close by.
“For the first few days we had trucks with big commercial heaters running under them, because obviously trucks carrying water can’t freeze,” he says, “and then we put a couple of the water moving trucks—our pumper and our tanker—in a municipal garage that we have access to in Crosby.”
Slowly, the RLFD was able to rebuild. This week they are set to return the last of the trucks they borrowed. “We wouldn’t be at the point we are now without our local fire service partners,” Granahan says. “Their help was instrumental in helping us recover from this incident.”
The next step was to find a home for their new fire hall. This involved an in-depth station study, which looked at everything from the station’s response area as a whole, to historical data pulled from calls, staffing and time to travel. Granahan says in choosing a new location it was important to acknowledge the municipality as a whole and look ahead to the future, since the new station will serve the Rideau Lakes community for at least 75 years at its new location.
“We wanted to know where we chose to have it built is going to offer the best service to the needs of the community,” he says. “We’re looking at several options, and each one is going to serve us well regardless of which is chosen.”
With the expenses that came as a result of the fire, this left a significant gap in the RLFD’s training budget. To help supplement this, The Shield Journal has awarded the RLFD with a $5,000 grant for technical training disciplines, firefighter survival and rapid intervention skill training.
According to Granahan, the Department has largely shifted their focus toward training and development over the last two to three years, a program that was put on hold by the fire. Granahan says he can’t stress enough how important ongoing and comprehensive training is to a Fire Department’s success, adding that with every dollar that goes into training, the return is easily 100 to one.
“With mandatory certification likely coming to the province in December, this money will specifically go toward our training needs and our overall development operationally. It’s a huge step,” Granahan says. “It’s definitely going to help us move forward and do our jobs better than we have ever been capable of doing before.”
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Twice per year, The Shield Journal offers Community Safety Grants to Canadian First Responder organizations including Fire Services, Search and Rescue, 9-1-1 Centres, Dispatch Centres and Police Services, Paramedic Services and Correctional Services. Visit theshieldjournal.ca/community-safety-grants to review eligibility criteria and apply. Funding decisions are made in April and September.
To learn about the previous recipients of our Community Safety Grant, click here.
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Photo: Rideau Lakes Fire Chief Scott Granahan (right) pictured with Mayor Arie Hoogenboom (left). Submitted by Scott Granahan.
Victoria St. Michael is a multimedia content creator with experience producing high-quality print and digital content. Victoria graduated with an Honours Degree in Digital Journalism from the University of Ottawa and a Journalism Diploma from Algonquin College, and has bylines in publications across North America. With an avid interest in humanitarian and global issues, she hopes to use her unique voice to help build a well-informed, forward thinking and progressive Canada.