An evacuation at Woodgrove Centre lasted roughly an hour Friday morning after a commercial fryer A&W in the food court caught fire. (Alex Rawnsley/NanaimoNewsNOW)

By NanaimoNewsNOW Staff

GREASE FIRE

Quick employee response avoids further damage after Woodgrove Centre fryer fire

Nov 26, 2021 | 12:11 PM

NANAIMO — Actions taken by a quick-thinking employee at the A&W inside the Woodgrove Centre food court has likely prevented a much more serious incident.

Fire Rescue crews were called to the shopping centre just after 9 a.m. on Friday, Nov. 26 after alarms were activated in the food court.

Troy Libbus, assistant fire chief, told NanaimoNewsNOW the restaurant’s commercial fryer caught fire with a staff member using a nearby extinguisher to deal with it.

“[When crews arrived] there was some residual fire going on and some smoke, our crews used an extinguisher to put it out. They proceeded to ventilate, get the smoke out of the area.”

No significant injuries were reported from the incident.

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Shoppers and workers were evacuated from the mall for a short time while the situation was dealt with.

Multiple engines responded and staged at various entrances to the mall.

Libbus said the employees action, using a specialized extinguisher on hand near all commercial cooking equipment, was the right call.

“When we have commercial deep fryers, each organization is responsible to have extinguishers installed over their cooking appliances, a (Class) K-extinguisher that will put these fires out.”

He added with any grease fires, whether in a commercial application or a home frying pan, people should call 911 immediately.

“You need to call right away. We don’t want to put water on it because it will accelerate the fire so we never put water on a grease fire.”

Fire loss prevention and representatives from Island Health were called to the scene to deal with the aftermath of the flare-up and firefighting efforts.

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