PHOTOS: Fish plant burns to the ground in Bay de Verde, N.L.
It was around 6 a.m. when Mayor Gerard Murphy was awoken by a firefighter. After seeing the billowing black smoke coming from the Quinlan Brothers Fish Plant, he quickly called a state of emergency, reports The Canadian Press. Hundreds of people were evacuated from the small town. Five separate fire departments were unable to contain the blaze.
The Quinlan Brothers plant employed around 700 people, including workers from Thailand. The cause of the fire has yet to be determined.
The loss of the business is expected to have a huge impact on the local economy: “It’s not only going to affect the people employed at the plant — it’s going to affect stores, garages,” Wanda Riggs, a worker at the plant, told The Canadian Press. “Everything was centred around employment at the plant.”