One tent and its contents were destroyed in a fire at a homeless encampment in Collingwood on the weekend.
Collingwood Fire Department, as well as Simcoe County Paramedics and Collingwood/The Blue Mountains OPP were called to a reported grass fire off Mountain Road on Sunday, Sept. 15 just before 11 a.m.
The fire was reported by multiple people, and turned out to be a tent on fire in the woods along the side of the road.
Fire Chief Dan Thurman confirmed there were no injuries and nobody was in the tent when it caught fire and was extinguished.
Firefighters did have to contend with challenges accessing the site, which is far from the road and not reachable by fire trucks and hoses. Crews carried in extinguishers to put out the fire, which did not spread beyond the tent and wood pallet it was on.
The cause of the fire is unclear, as the tent and all the items inside it were melted and burned.
Thurman said the fire department crew did encourage the other people living there to come to the fire station for a smoke alarm if they couldn't get one for themselves.
"One person did stop by to get one, and even though it's a tent, it still helps," said Thurman.
Firefighters spent about an hour on the scene, and off-duty firefighters were called in to staff the fire station while the crew worked on the tent fire.
