Fire on historic train in North Bay ‘suspicious,’ police say

Members of the North Bay Fire Department responded to a fire on a historic train late Saturday evening on Oak Street.

"It's a suspicious fire because it's vagrants that have entered the train illegally," said Fire Chief Jason Whiteley.

"They were camping and living in the train illegally ... We don't think it's an arson fire because we don't think they intended to set the fire. They either left something on for cooking or heating and vacated the train and it caught their belongings on fire."

The locomotive is more than 100 years old and belongs to the City of North Bay. Ian Kilgour, the city’s director of community services, lamented the loss.

"It's unfortunate, it was donated from the Ontario Northland Railway to the City of North Bay back in the 60's," Kilgour said.

"It was originally a static display at Lee Park and then it was moved here."

Whiteley told CTV News the damage isn't significant and that the train can be restored.

"I wouldn't say there's significant damage, but there is damage," he said.

"It's a historical object that at some point the city and groups are hoping to restore it to what it used to be like."

There's still hope the locomotive can be used again in some capacity in the future.

"It will be up to city council but the hope is for it to get a better place down here at the waterfront on the former rail lands so that people can enjoy it," said Kilgour.

"There is interest in the community to make something happen, we hope to work with those interests, depending on budget and feasibility to make something happen."

For now, both the city and fire officials confirmed that the locomotive will be closed off with metal so that no one can enter it.