Its been 2 years now since the devastating fire that destroyed 50 homes on the west side of Gun Lake. This is an update to our story I wrote 2 years ago.
After all the trees had been cleared from our property we hired a contractor to remove the burnt trailer and all the other debris, take out all the burned foundations, clear a spot for our 1999 motor home that we purchased with some of the insurance money. We bought a $250 dollar gazebo from Costco instead of our beautiful deck that was destroyed by the fire.
Right now we have a bare lot with no shade, burnt trees still around us, a motor home, gazebo, and dock still left. ( the dock was also damaged by the person who cut the trees down for us) Yes a tree landed on our one surviving item, the dock. He would not claim responsibility so we are trying to fix it up ourselves.
Before the fire, we were powered by solar power and batteries, put in by my husband ( electrician) and he maintained the system. Unfortunately my husband passed away last November of lung cancer, so now we will have an extra expense to put in hydro. We are at the estimate stage of looking at hydro at this time.
We have exhausted all our insurance money a while ago and are now putting in our own money. We did receive a grant of $1000 from the Downton Lake Fire Loss fund. We did all the work remotely, hiring and did not return until this summer. We do feel the SLRD (except for Sal) did not understand a lot of the issues we faced, and the red tape was something I never would of imagined being so hard to navigate.
I was asked to write an update to our story as with many of us it is still not over. We still need support and help from the community. The emotional impact of this fire has effected us all and its nice to see neighbours moving forward. The financial impact is huge on what has been lost in this fire with most of us now putting in our own money. For us we can’t ever have what we had before and I’m sure it’s the same for others. I am including some photos of our property at the moment and a happy picture of all our neighbours reuniting after 2 years.
Vicki Marlatt, Rick Leigh, Dan Leigh and Kristin Leigh
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