Five boats went up in flames in the Grande-Entrée cave on the Îles-de-la-Madeleine overnight from Saturday to Sunday.
Images shared on social media show flames shooting out of boats used for crab fishing.
Municipal Mayor Antonin Valiquette said no one was injured during the incident and the cause is unknown.
The latter noted that it took firefighters more than three hours to extinguish the blaze, which destroyed five boats and damaged a sixth.
“According to the first testimonies and the surveillance cameras on board, the fire broke out on the first boat, and with the wind, the fire spread to the other four boats nearby,” explains the mayor in an interview with LCN.
“Two charred bodies are still floating and three have sunk to the bottom of the canal,” he adds. “The next steps are to recover these carcasses with pollution control.”
The damage would have been worse if the wind had blown in a different direction from the north.
“The wind blowing in this direction prevented the fire from extinguishing [ne] Spread to a large number of other boats.
The harbor houses about a hundred boats, or about one-third of the islands’ lobster boat fleet.
“It’s a very hard blow for the owners of these boats and the fishermen,” explains Mr Valiquette. “Beyond that, the entire Magdalen Islands community is feeling the shock, because boats are often more than a work tool for security and fishermen at sea.”
“For some captains, their boat is almost a member of their family,” he continues. “It’s a very rough one. It’s a rude awakening this morning across the Magdalen Islands.
Joël Arseneau, MP for Îles-de-la-Madeleine, responded to the news in X.
“My thoughts are with these captains as they begin their last week of fishing tomorrow,” he wrote.
Watch the full interview in the video above.
