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A potentially deadly disaster was averted by a matter of minutes when an arena roof collapsed Monday, turning an afternoon at an equestrian boarding facility into a terrifying “hell.”

“This was my version of hell,” said Morgen Langner, operations manager of JM Equestrian near Okotoks.

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“Lives were nearly lost,” Langner wrote on Facebook. “(It) was one of the most terrifying days that I am pretty sure myself and my incredible crew will ever experience.”

A group of 16 people — along with horses, cats, dogs and pigs — had just rushed out of the barn and riding arena when the roof collapsed in the late afternoon.

“Our last person evacuated the building as it went down,” Langner told Postmedia.

Langner said those at the arena heard ticks and bangs around 4 p.m. and thought ice was breaking off the roof. But about 30 minutes later, an inspection of the attic showed trusses were falling and a large-scale evacuation — practised in previous drills — was ordered.

People were instructed to move to the nearest walls and leave the premises, while adults with emergency training began evacuating livestock.

“At 4:46 the arena and barn was emptied,” Langner wrote. “At approximately 4:49 . . . the entire roof collapsed . . . Please. I beg of you. Trust your gut. I can’t tell you how many times we said, ‘it’s just ice.’ ”

Although it’s not certain what caused the 15-year-old structure to collapse, Langner suspects heavy snow might have been a factor.

“We’ve had so much snowfall that it’s tough to say. We are waiting on an engineer.”