Radar Road in the Hanmer area was briefly closed May 3 after a garage fire at a farm property spread to the exterior wall of the nearby house, and also caused a grass fire.
Greater Sudbury Fire Chief Rob Grimwood said firefighters were called to the scene at 2:25 p.m., and cleared the scene just before 5 p.m.
There were no injuries as a result of the incident, which Grimwood said is not suspicious.
He said the property owner had been burning materials outdoors earlier in the day.
As it was a fairly windy day, Grimwood suspects that the wind picked up the embers and spread it to the garage structure, which was completely destroyed. He said the destroyed structure contained items such as farm equipment.
The fire then spread to the exterior wall of the nearby house, but crews were able to contain the fire so that the only damage was melted siding.
The wind also picked up embers from the fire, which caused a grass fire on the nearby field, as well as a smaller grass fire on the other side of the road. Grimwood said these fires were contained fairly quickly.
Greater Sudbury Police were called in to close the road while firefighting operations were underway. Grimwood explained that there are no fire hydrants in the rural area where the fire occurred, so they needed to bring in tanker trucks.
“People need to burn in accordance with the open air fire burning bylaw, which is the most modern safety practices,” he said.
“It only takes a very little bit of wind to spread somebody's outdoor fire to a nearby structure. So people need to follow the bylaw and burn safely. You know, it's such a terrible thing to watch what started out as a small, well-intentioned outdoor fire cause so much damage.”