Baytex donates water trailer to Coleville Fire Department

By Joan Janzen
joanjanzen@yahoo.com

The Coleville Fire Department was the grateful recipient of a substantial donation in a water trailer donated by Baytex Energy. The trailer was delivered on Tuesday, July 20th, by Baytex representatives. It can hold approximately 34,000 litres (or 34 cubes) of water and is valued at $40,000.

Members of the Coleville Fire Department, the Mayor of Coleville and the Reeve of the RM of Oakdale, were invited to attend the presentation on July 20th at 1:30 p.m. Dean Ellis, Coleville Fire Chief, was extremely appreciative of the donation.

“This is a fairly large donation, and it’s good publicity for Baytex, who employ quite a few people in this area. We had quite a few fires last year, and Baytex obviously took note of what was needed in the area,” he said. Consequently, Dean was contacted by Jim Zalesak, HSE Advisor for Baytex, who asked if the Coleville Fire Department would be interested in the donation of a water trailer. “When a tank is expired, Baytex can no longer use it for their purposes to hold oil, but it’s still useful for water. They made a similar donation to Maidstone as well.”

Dean explained that the tank, which was built in 2007, has exceeded its life in the oilfield. However, instead of being scrapped, it will be cleaned out and used for a different purpose. “It will work perfectly for what we need and will make a huge difference,” Dean said. “We’ll be able to provide mutual aid to all our neighbouring fire departments with this, including Kerrobert, Major, Coleville, Dodsland and Kindersley. Our biggest obstacle is not having enough water for an incident, like a grass fire. But this will increase our ability to have a better hold on what we need it for.”

The Coleville Fire Department consists of eleven volunteers and has a water truck that was donated a couple of years ago, which is a big asset. Fortunately, the fire department is also helped along by the agriculture community.

“Our ag community is huge, and they come scrambling to help,” Dean said. “It’s great! And we have mutual aid from surrounding fire departments. But this is a huge donation for our area. We’ve never had anything quite like it,” he concluded.

PHOTO BY KATE WINQUIST