The Lake of the Woods Milling Company grain elevator in Elba, southwestern Manitoba, was in the process of being dismantled to sell wood and other materials that could be rescued before burning on Tuesday. “It’s unbelievable. There was a spark that went up to the roof line, which is 40 feet above ground level,” said Troy Angus, who bought the structure and a nearby United Grain Growers elevator last year at a municipal auction. . “An ember went into a hole – it was like being sucked almost into a hole the size of a football – and almost when it fell there was smoke and then fire.” Angus, who owns The Den Authentic Barnwood, procures, rescues and sells antique wood. He began the demolition process on both elevators in January, posting materials for sale on his website. The goal was to recover as much wood as possible, Angus said, but there was some wood waste. On Tuesday, he and the crew performed a controlled burn on some of that junk wood in a low mud, which had a shallow layer of water inside. “We were almost done, so we decided to stand around the fire until it burned and put it out so we could go home with the mind that the fire was out,” Angus said. Grain elevator Elva’s Lake of the Woods Milling Company as seen in September. (Submitted by Gordon Goldsborough)
All day, a light breeze was blowing from the south, “the perfect direction away from the elevators,” he said. Then everything changed. In the last hour, the wind changed coming from the east, towards the elevator Lake of the Woods. “It sank completely in 14 minutes,” Angus said. “We knew we had to lower the elevator in a hurry,” he said, in order to protect the hydroelectric lines above it and ensure it would not collapse or damage the CPR rails next to it. The crew happened to have a track excavator on site to push the elevator down in a controlled direction, letting it fall into a flaming pile. He was gone in an hour. “I have never felt so hot again,” Angus said.

The deconstruction was in “home”

The crew was about to start its Phase 4 the process of deconstruction of the five-phase project at the beginning of next week, which would include placing the construction shell or cradle on the side and dismantling the large wooden openings two by six. An attached shed and an office building had already been removed and dismantled. “We were at home. We had already prepared everything, so the ground was level all the way,” Angus said. “It was lucky because we were able to maneuver on the track hoe quickly to undermine one side and push the elevator.” After 125 years of life, the operation of the grain elevator Lake of the Woods Milling Company came to an end on Tuesday. (Submitted by Troy Angus)
By the time the fire brigade arrived, everything was under control, he said. “Any other time of year, this would open a bad fire on the grass. Considering that the ground was wet from the spring and it was a bit rainy, rainy all day, it also helped us.” There was no loss of equipment, no loss of life, no loss of anything other than the lift itself “so the result was the best possible scenario,” Angus said. Gordon Golsboro, president of the Manitoba Historic Society, was hoping to be there when the elevator shaft overturned to the side, “to watch the final hours of Canada’s oldest elevator,” he told CBC News in March. He said on Thursday he was saddened by the fire but not cracked. “The grief was already gone when I came to terms with the fact that the elevator was going to go down, one way or another,” he said. He is frustrated more material than the elevator now will not be saved. “The difficult part for me now is to see the tremendous waste of valuable resources, given the careful work Troy has done to show how such old buildings can be reused constructively.” Angus said before the fire, the crew “nevertheless pulled a nice stack of wood out of the elevator, not as much as we intended.” Built in September 1897, the Lake of the Woods elevator took the crown as the oldest after the 1895 elevator in Fleming, Sask. – also a LOTW elevator – destroyed by fire in 2010. An elevator built in Austin, Mann, in 1901 and later moved to the nearby Manitoba Agricultural Museum, is now the oldest in the country. Some argue that Port Perry has the oldest, built in 1874, but Goldsborough said it is more of a warehouse-style design, not a swing style synonymous with iconic guards. The UGG grain elevator on the Elbe has holes that leave rain and snow for decades, but Troy Angus says there is still great wood to be recovered. (Submitted by Gordon Goldsborough)
Angus said he would now focus on the United Grain Growers elevator, built around 1916, which is in the same phase as the Lake of the Woods elevator. Angus and his team alternated between the two structures. “Next week we will install it as planned,” he said. The UGG elevator has been missing tin sections from the façade for decades, allowing rain and snow to get in, but Angus said there is still some great wood to be recovered. “We hope we can make up for lost ground.”