Blaze rips through restaurant
The Barrelhouse owner Rod Greenwood was shattered after fire ripped through his restaurant on Tuesday night for the second time in less than two weeks.
However, the night’s fire was far more serious and resulted in extensive interior damage.
The first fire, thought to have been caused by an electrical fault, started in the ceiling above the kitchen on Friday February 28. That fire, which started at around 9am, was put out following the quick actions of plumber Brent Howell.
Damage in that fire had not been fully repaired so the restaurant was not yet open, although a function was to be held on Friday evening in the bar, Greenwood said.
“The bottle store was up and running well, but nothing much else has been repaired except for part of the roof.
A new meter board has arrived but it hasn’t been installed yet.”
Tuesday night’s fire started at around 9.30pm, 45 minutes after Greenwood had closed up the bottle store for the night.
“I was at home and I had a call from the security company saying the intruder alarm had gone off, but not the fire alarm. So I don’t know what happened.”
Fire chief Peter Sinclair said a fire investigator from Hastings was at the scene this morning.
He said last night’s fire had broken out in a different part of the restaurant.
Fire damage to the building was extensive and estimated to be about 80 per cent of the restaurant.
“It took a bit of effort getting into the building as it was well locked up.”
Around 40 fire personnel and nine appliances attended the scene.
A special appliance was called in from Palmerston North and this hoisted two fire crew above the fire so they could use infrared equipment to identify hot spots.
Fire crew and appliances from Dannevirke, Woodville, Norsewood, Ormondville, Ashley Clinton and Napier attended the fire while a crew from Hastings stood by at Dannevirke fire station to respond to any other fire calls.
Sinclair said crews were at the scene until 1.30am, but the Dannevirke crew spent until 3am cleaning up equipment.
At 4am a fire crew responded to a call out to a car that had gone into a ditch but the vehicle was recovered without the brigade’s assistance.