The scene on Monday, April 6 in the southeast end of Estevan was like something out of a movie. Multiple explosions ripped open the north wall of a business, set several other nearby businesses on fire, ignited small fires in a few nearby vehicles, and left molten debris strewn about. And the Estevan Fire Department was right in the middle of it.

Almost every member of the department responded to the explosion just before 10:00 that morning, and they battled a string of fires connected to it for over six hours. With help from the RCMP, Estevan Police Service, Conservation Officers, City EMOs and even the Salvation Army, they finally got the blaze under control.

"While en route to the scene, several blocks out, we encountered quite a bit of smoke," said Fire Chief Dale Feser. "It almost appeared like fog there. I wasn't too sure whether it was a weather event or if this was related to the explosion, however, this definitely did have a relationship to the fire and the previous explosion."

Feser said he arrived at the scene first in his command vehicle and was faced with a daunting sight. The sheer scale of the fire impressed even the veteran chief of the Estevan Fire Department.

"There's fire everywhere and you're pulling up on scene and establishing incident command," he said, "and you're trying to take in all your variables and address the issues that are coming your way and assess priorities of what needs to be taken care of, it is very daunting, to say the least. I just can't thank the firefighters enough, we have such a well-trained staff."

All but a handful of members of the fire department responded as what was already a serious enough call of an industrial fire got even more so when, as they were on the way, they heard the explosions. They arrived to find the series of fires in the shop, in nearby buildings, and on vehicles.

"The most concerning thing at the time of our arrival was that there were unaccounted for workers," Feser said. "We went in and did a quick 360-degree assessment of the scene and located six workers that were on the east side of the occupancy."

All of the workers were able to leave under their own power, but one had suffered radiant burns from the heat coming off the fire. He was treated in hospital and released later on the same day, the only injury from the impressive-looking explosions.

The explosions can be seen on video all over social media, and on Discover Estevan. Feser did not discourage this. In fact, if anyone has a video of the incident, he wants them to come forward to help the fire department investigate the cause of the explosion.

"We did see several videos, and we do encourage people if they have photos or videos at this time to please send it to the Estevan Fire Department," he said, "via the Facebook link on our Facebook feed. That way we can compile some evidence as far as establishing timelines and what exactly occurred just prior to the explosions."

Feser said they believe the cause of the fire to be "an industrial process" but don't have full information at this time. As for what caused the explosions, that is still under investigation. No firefighters were injured as a result of the fire.