Richard Morgan photos
* The Norpac Fisheries building on Commissioner Street looked deceptively stable, in this morning-after scene, as firemen fought to prevent fresh breakouts of the $1 million conflagration that gutted the wooden frame building. City firemen (bottom), aided in their night-long battle by the Burrard Inlet fireboat, were hampered by ammonia fumes from the plant's compressors.
Norpac Fisheries plant destroyed by night fire
Ironically, fire which gutted the Norpac Fisheries building in Vancouver broke out the first time since the start of the herring season that no night shift employees were on duty.
The fire, spotted at 11:30 p.m. March 23 and believed to have started in the plant's engine room, destroyed the 100-foot square wood frame building which also housed several other businesses at 2199 Commissioner.
The building had an estimated value of $500,000 and equipment and stock inside — including 40 tons of herring roe — had an equal value. There were no injuries.
Firemen appeared to have the flames contained and proceeded to rescue company records when ammonia from the cold storage plant equipment began exploding.
Reinforcements were summoned, and at the height of the blaze there were 11 fire trucks, the Burrard Inlet fireboat and various support vehicles on the scene.
Fire Chief Armad Konig credited the fireboat with preventing the blaze from spreading along the waterfront.
The fireboat trained hose lines on the fire and also provided water pressure for other pumping equipment ashore.
Ammonia fumes caused the
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greatest difficulty in fighting the blaze, hampering even firemen equipped with masks.
Ted Moir, principal owner of Norpac Fisheries, said the
company's new plant, adjacent to the old one, should be able to accommodate all but about 30 of the 50 to 100 shoreworkers normally employed by the company.
Knut Bristed dead after long career
A career at sea from cabin boy to fishing veteran ended with the death of Knut Johan Bristed in Vancouver on February 20.
Hospitalized last spring and in failing health, he was 72 years of age. All but 15 of those years he spent on the water, for he went to sea before his tenth birthday.
Retired skipper Sam Nybo of Vancouver recalls that he accompanied Bristed, who was born at Haarid, Norway, when he immigrated to this country in 1929 and found employment in the fishing industry.
Over the years he fished for Canfisco in almost all fisheries, and as skipper on packers. Nybo remembers fishing with him on the seiners Pacific Sunset and Pacific Queen in the post-war years.
Bristed was aboard the Pacific Sunset when she sank during the reduction herring fishery off the west nine years ago without casualties.
As it transpired, the vessel that rescued them, Bering Sea, became Bristed's last boat, on which he worked under skipper Olav Rosted.
A UFAWU member since 1949, he retired about five years ago.
KNUT BRISTED ... he went to sea before his tenth birthday.
He is survived by his wife Pearl, and a cousin in Norway.
A funeral service was held February 23 from St. Augustine's Church in Vancouver, Rev. W. J. Cullinan officiating.
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2/THE FISHERMAN — MARCH 26, 1976