A fire in Sandwich town Monday night has temporarily displaced the men living at a Windsor transitional recovery home. Their kitchen has been completely gutted but community donations are helping.
Co-founder of the recovery home says their kitchen will not be ready anytime soon
Pratyush Dayal · CBC News
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A fire in Sandwich town Monday night has temporarily displaced the men living at a Windsor transitional recovery home. Their kitchen has been completely gutted but community donations are helping.
“We deal with tragedy every day and it's unavoidable in the kind of work that we do. However, when these things happen, there's just something that blossoms – a miracle and unity,” Robert Sandwith, the co-founder of the Hand in Hand Support, told CBC Radio's Windsor Morning Thursday.
He said the fire started on the stove and burnt the whole kitchen down with the smoke building through the entire structure. Sandwith said everyone was evacuated and no injuries were reported.
“It went into the drywall a little bit and [into the] electrical system. So, we had the gas shut off the same night, the power shut off for the whole building. So, significant damage.”
Chris Kreibich, acting chief at Windsor Fire and Rescue Services, told CBC News Thursday night that the fire started around 10:40 p.m. Monday.
"The fire occurred in the kitchen and was contained in the kitchen," he said. "But the smoke damage migrated through the building."
Kreibich said the building suffered approximately $70,000 in damages.
Sandwith said while the 50 men will be able to return home soon, the kitchen won't be ready for much longer.
He said the men have been through a lot of trauma and they're resilient. With the Windsor community coming together to help them, he said that transition will be faster.
“The pouring from the community on every faucet has been absolutely amazing and these guys are just surrounded with love with other organizations, partnered organizations, counselors, grief counselors, peer support, churches,” he said.
“Everybody's come together just to surround these guys with support. That is just phenomenal.”
Sandwith said there is light at the end of the tunnel and he is hopeful that with the restoration process going on, they should be able to use the building next week but the future of the kitchen is still “undetermined”.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Pratyush Dayal covers climate change, immigration and race and gender issues among general news for CBC News in Windsor. Before that, he worked for three years at CBC News Saskatchewan. He has previously written for the Globe and Mail, the Vancouver Sun, and the Tyee. He holds a master's degree in journalism from UBC and can be reached at pratyush.dayal@cbc.ca
With files from Windsor Morning
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