Devastating Fire in Cane Garden, St. Thomas Leaves Businesses in Ruins, Owners Vow to Rebuild

Three business owners are picking up the pieces following a devastating fire in Cane Garden, St Thomas, on Saturday.

The businesses – printery Colour XL Inc., vehicle parts store Quality Bus and Truck Spares Inc. and vehicle retrofitting shop The Ultimate Speedshop – were destroyed by the blaze, which left behind nothing but cracked stone, bent metal, destroyed vehicles and heartache.

Yesterday Proprietor of Quality Bus and Truck Spares Imran Mohamed was on the site where his business once stood gathering what little he could salvage. He said he planned to rebuild once the okay was given.

“We’re going to have the debris removed, then engineers will come to evaluate the site and the foundation to see if we can rebuild. If so, I will rebuild,” she said.

Mohamed was working on bringing a forklift back to life, one of two which were damaged during the fire. Two more were beyond repair, blackened and broken among the debris. He said some of his six staff were with him helping to find missing items, while lamenting that he did not know how to keep them all employed.

“They are still employed now but this will take a year to rebuild so I don’t know,” he said.

Provided water

The down, but-not-out business owner again publicly applauded owner of B’s Recycling Paul Bynoe for going “above and beyond” by helping provide water to fight the fire and equipment to remove the charred debris.

Mohamed said he was out “hundreds of thousands” of dollars noting that one spark of hope was that the business was insured, though he was uncertain of the process.

On Instagram, management of Colour XL said they too were down but not out as they were going to return.

The company wrote: “On Saturday night, 1st March, there was a fire at Cane Garden that destroyed the entire building where we operated. Three businesses were in this building and all of us suffered complete loss from the fire. Luckily, no one was injured in the blaze. What we lost, we can replace . . . in time.

“I want to extend a warm and heartfelt thank you to everyone who reached out with their phone calls, messages, thoughts, prayers and assistance in any way. The Colour XL family

is so grateful to have family, friends, customers, vendors and associates that care so much about our well-being. The outpouring of love has been overwhelming.

“The thoughtfulness of our clients has shown true appreciation for the hard work, dedication and top class service of our fantastic team who genuinely care about what we do, how we do it and what we stand for, each and every day. We are still here, just working on a new plan. Standby for greatness.”

The owner of The Ultimate Speedshop declined to comment.

The DAILY NATION spoke to neighbour Shelah Parris, who said she had to temporarily move out of her home, though there were no issues with smoke.

“I was instructed to move out as a precaution, where I stayed with family and got the okay to move back in on Sunday night. The wind blew all the smoke back towards the school,” she said.

Unfamiliar noise

Parris said that night she heard an unfamiliar noise and looked out to witness a sight she would never forget.

“I’m accustomed to them working but I heard a different sound and when I looked, I saw my yard lit up. It was a horrible experience, the flames were so high in the air, it gave me the nerves,” she said.

From there, Parris said she called the emergency services as well as Mohamed to tell him his building was on fire. She recalled watching the blaze from a neighbour’s house, hoping her home was not going to go up in smoke as well.

“At one point I thought it would affect my house but God is good,” she said.

Fumes from the still smouldering site caused the closure of Sharon Primary School yesterday and Tuesday. A man in nearby Arthur’s Seat said they were still picking up hints of smoke from time to time and while it had affected “one or two” people, they generally were okay. (CA)