MAN KILLED IN FIRE WAS TYPE TO GIVE THE SHIRT OFF HIS BACK

37-YEAR-OLD RYAN KONKIN WAS KILLED IN A FIRE ON JAN. 12 AT SSONIX PRODUCTS

Nicole Konkin describes her brother Ryan as a "little old lady in a man's body."

"All the old ladies from back home were always trying to figure out, 'what he's up to? What do you think of his garden and what was he cooking?" she said. "When Christmas came around, he was always the one cooking the Ukrainian Christmas dinner and sharing it with people, (and he always had) the best recipes and the best cabbage rolls."

Her 37-year-old brother, Ryan Konkin, was killed in the Jan. 12 explosion at St. Catharines' Ssonix Products.

When the fire broke out just after 6 a.m., Ryan was the lone worker on site at the time.

Nicole — who travelled from Edmonton and spent a few days in St. Catharines — said her brother's job was to separate chemicals from containers they were shipped in, and then clean the containers.

That particular morning, Nicole said her brother was uncharacteristically early to work.

"He didn't want his fiancée to be late for work, so he said she can just drop him off early and take the truck and get to work on time," Nicole explained. "She had just dropped him off and was just down the road when the building exploded."

When she got to the hospital, Nicole said her brother was covered in burns.

Before they intubated him, she said he was able to say, "I just opened the door."

In a way, she said, it's lucky he was early that day, so no one else got hurt. The cause of the explosion is still under investigation.

Described as the kind of guy who would give you "the shirt off his back," Nicole said her brother was always dropping off cases of water for those in need.

After snowstorms, he could be found driving around shovelling people's driveways, she said.

Originally from Saskatchewan, Ryan moved to St. Catharines more than a decade ago after visiting his sister while she was in school. Nicole said he fell in love with the "small town in a big city" feeling.

"I guess it was the best place he could ever think of to live, and he just loved it," she said.

"We couldn't get him to leave if our life depended on it. I asked him so many times to move to Edmonton and help me with work, and he just didn't care. He wanted to stay there."

After his death, Nicole started a GoFundMe to help Ryan's fiancée Natalia live out their dream of having a food truck. The fund has already surpassed its $10,000 goal.

According to Nicole, the couple had been working on the project already, and the business licence was approved the day before the fire.

To keep up with the food truck, visit @ryans_ lounge on Instagram.

On the Instagram page, his fiancée Natalia writes about how much she'll miss him.

"Ryan was a gentle soul on Earth. He lived for the day, and kept working towards bigger and better things, jumping over so many hurdles throughout his life," a post reads. "One of the things that always astonished me was his ever-present calming energy. 'It is what it is' he'd say."

Nicole said the hardest part is saying goodbye to her brother.

"Unless you lose a sibling that you're really close to, you don't realize that that relationship (can) never be replaced because it's the one person that knows everything about your entire life from start to finish, that you don't ever have to ... tell them the back story," she said. "They just already know. They know who you are, what makes you tick ... they already get it."

Ryan leaves behind his fiancée Natalia, and a 15year-old son Vincent.

A vigil was held last Saturday at Lakeside Park in Port Dalhousie in his honour.