Blaze claims 'Pollard's Christmas lights

Christmas 2010 could be a dark place for a north Westmeath town, as their Christmas lights - valued at over €10,000 - were destroyed in a fire earlier this year, the Westmeath Examiner has learned.A local businessman has just realised that the fire which destroyed his business premises has also consumed his town's Christmas lights.Tom Egan, from Castlepollard, has only just remembered that the lights, which festooned the decorative trees around the square, were stored on his premises. Tom was the owner of Egan's Garage, which caught fire and was razed to the ground in February."We lost so much in the fire that we are still remembering items stored in the garage. It was only last week that someone said to me 'What about the Christmas Lights?', that I remembered that the lights were stored there. The fire destroyed everything so they are gone," Tom said.Tom would estimate the lights are worth about €1,000 a tree and there are about 14 trees decorated every year."The local businesses in the area bought the lights and make a contribution every year to their up-keep. They were uninsured in the fire so we are now going to have to begin fundraising to replace them. It is an absolute tragedy that they were lost in the fire," said Tom.Tom has just re-opened his garage, that had to be entirely rebuilt. The original garage, which was a landmark building in the area, was filled with items of historical interest including machinery from the sixties, vintage farm machinery and beautifully restored agricultural tools.On February 11th, Egan's garage was completely destroyed by fire. The fire itself was immediately deemed a major incident due to the fact the garage contained acetylene gas welding cylinders, a large number of tyres, vehicle batteries, and a 3 Phase electrical power supply. This posed a real danger to firemen who were unable to approach because of the danger of an explosion due to the volatile contents of the garage.On the day, the Fire Services primary concern was to prevent the fire from spreading to the Egan's home.