Brings the total of January barn fires to six
By Diego Flammini
Assistant Editor, North American Content
Farms.com
Ontario’s farming community continues to experience loss as a Tuesday morning barn fire in Parkhill, north of London, killed 2,000 pigs.
The fire brings the total number of barn blazes in January to six.
Emergency crews arrived on scene between 2 and 3 a.m. A few silos are still standing but the fire destroyed the barn.
Ontario Pork said staff from the Ministry of Environment are on the scene but don't have other details at the moment.
According to Ontario Pork, 4.97 million hogs were marketed in 2014 by 1,524 pork producers in the province.
Ontario’s pork industry generates $867 million in GDP and $2.5 billion in economic output “from farm to fork.”
This is the second barn fire to hit near Parkhill in a matter of months. On Nov. 3, 2015 a barn fire occurred killing about 50 cattle.
Ontario has seen a recent string of barn fires with three more taking place over the weekend and all within a span of about two and a half weeks.
The first occurred at an empty barn in Georgetown at Ninth Line and 5 Sideroad around 5 a.m. Saturday morning.
Two barns and a vacant home are located on the property and the smaller of the two burnt. There were no animals inside the barn but there was cattle outside.
The second weekend barn fire happened at a farm near Delaware on Sunday morning.
When firefighters arrived around 6 a.m. they found the barn engulfed in flames.
Approximately 500 milking goats and 30 cattle were lost in the blaze and damage is estimated to be around $2 million.
The third weekend fire occurred Sunday afternoon in Flamborough.
When Hamilton firefighters arrived just after 12:30 p.m., they found heavy smoke and fire coming out of a building.
There were six tractors and other equipment inside the building, but no livestock.
The damage is estimated at $100,000.
With the fires that occurred over the weekend, the total number of farm or barn fires in Ontario is now six.
On Jan. 5, a fire in Puslinch claimed the lives of 43 Standardbred horses and a Mount Forest barn fire on Jan. 14 killed 13 Arabian horses.