Fire at Orcas Artworks. Photo courtesy of Tom Tillman
A second fire at Willis Lane structure extinguished
From the Orcas Island Fire and Rescue website orcasfire.org
Orcas Island Fire & Rescue was dispatched to two working structure fires in Olga.
The initial call came in at 3:02 am [July 19] as a smoke investigation, and the first Engine found the Olga Artworks on fire and called in a full response.
Orcas Fire and Rescue respond to two fire calls after 3 a.m. this morning. (Cara Russell/Orcas Issues photo, reproduction with written permission only.)
The fire was mainly on the east side of the building with the majority of fire damage to the exterior and attic space. It took crews approximately 30 minutes to extinguish the fire.
At 3:29 am a structure fire was called in at Willis Lane, which is less than three miles from Olga Artworks. Available crews from Olga Artworks responded to the second working fire and extinguished the 30×30 residential structure which was heavily involved.
Both scenes are still working on overhaul and property salvage. Mutual aid has been called for firefighters from San Juan and Lopez Islands fire departments.
There are no injuries to civilians or firefighters.
Both scenes are under investigation by the San Juan County Fire Marshal’s Office.
Thanks to Eirena Birkenfeld.
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The Olga Daze planning committee is saddened to hear of the fire at the Artworks building and want to help our good friends and neighbors. Olga Daze will go on as planned but we will have donation boxes for the Artworks artists and the Café Olga owners, Bobby and Bev. We also plan to donate a portion of our proceeds to the Olga Strawberry Council funds to help the artists and café owners cover uninsured losses.
Bev and Bobby have been very generous to our event over the years donating a very popular blackberry pie to our silent auction. They had planned to do so again this year. We want to give back to them and John and Joni Trumball of Rose’s Café and Bakery have generously donated a pie that we will raffle off and donate the proceeds to Bev and Bobby.
We hope to see you all at Olga Daze. We are going to have fun and help get our neighbors back in business as soon as possible.