Bus barn fire traced to electrical malfunction in bus engine compartment

LETHBRIDGE – Fire investigators have traced the cause of a fire that damaged the city’s transit facility June 16 to an electrical malfunction in a bus’s engine compartment.

Crews are working to restore full operation to the bus barn as soon as possible. But in the meantime, people who reload their Breeze cards by phone may experience delays, the city said Monday, June 25. Buses have been forced out of the building while it is repaired and cleaned up, and that’s affecting communication to the buses.

People who reload their cards directly at sales locations are not affected.

Nobody was hurt in the fire, which was quickly extinguished. Smoke damage to the building was estimated at $300,000, while the fire itself caused $200,000 in damage to the bus.