Doug Chinnery and a colleague responded to a report of a backyard fire last week at the home of a man they knew to have mental-health issues. The fire had raised safety concerns, and the firefighters drove to the residence in Chinnery’s car.
“We walked in the driveway and I called out the person’s name,” Chinnery said. “As soon as I did that, I could just here him screaming from the back of the property saying. ‘Do you want to fight me? Do you want to fight me?’ ”
With that, the man came running toward them, grabbing an axe out of a chopping block along the way.
“He chased us out of his yard with the axe,” Chinnery said. “Before I got to the end of the property, I heard the axe land on the ground beside the firefighter that I brought with me. He had thrown it at us.”
The pair ran down the road, leaving Chinnery’s car behind. The man yelled threats as they ran, saying he was going to shoot them.
Comox Valley RCMP were called, but it took some time for them to get to the island. Officers called Chinnery after the man had been taken into custody.
Chinnery said he was told that there were propane cylinders and gas cans on his car that had been wired to a battery. Police took them off, but when Chinnery went to pick up the car the next morning he found it had also been spray-painted and had a tail light smashed.
Damage to the car could be up to $600.
