Saturday marks the five year anniversary of the largest residential fire in Edmonton’s history.

On July 21, 2007, many Edmontonians were left homeless when a raging inferno tore through dozens of homes in the south Edmonton neighbourhood of MacEwan.

Nearly 100 homes were either destroyed or damaged in the blaze and many residents in the neighbourhood still remember the day vividly.

“We watched the things go up in flames, from house to house,” said John Pye, whose home was damaged by the fire.

“Basically everything melted because of the heat. The windows cracked, the whole siding, the shingles, and the roof.”

About $20 million worth of property burned.

“When we were out in the field looking at it after everything had burned to the ground, it was like a science fiction war movie,” Pye said.

“All you could see is like the gas pipes sticking out of the ground and a two foot flame. It was unreal to fathom that.”

Massive flames and driving winds proved to be challenging for even the most experienced firefighters.

“From a firefighters perspective it’s almost overwhelming,” said Fire Chief Ken Block.

“It was a great save actually. It could have been much, much worse.”

Block says prior to 2007, the fire department was seeing between 10 to 15 significant construction site fires but since the MacEwan blaze and changes made to building codes, the number of those fires have reduced significantly.

“In 2011 we didn’t have one. So far this year we’ve had one, so that really does tell the tale. You couple that with code changes that resulted in non-combustable material being used under the vinyl siding, that’s made a tremendous difference as well,” Block said.

“They are much safer than they were five years ago.”

Five years later, people who live in the neighbourhood are still awaiting justice.

“We come out and it’s just destruction,” said Laura Piers, who lives in the neighbourhood and remembers the fire well.

“There were people who lost everything, completely everything.”

The fire was deemed as arson but no one has ever been charged.

Police consider it a cold case and say there haven’t been any recent tips or new information for detectives to investigate.

“Who doesn’t want to know who did it and why, what the motive was,” Piers said.

“Somebody needs to pay for that crime.”

With files from Sean Amato