Blaze levels Southdale apartment block

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This article was published 27/08/2018 (2760 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A good Samaritan was credited for saving the lives of dozens of people after a horrendous fire destroyed one apartment block in Southdale and heavily damaged a twin block beside it.

A total of 24 families were left homeless after the early-morning blaze Sunday roared through the attic of the first three-storey block, opening its roof to the sky and spread to the neighbouring block.

The three-storey apartment block at 1085 Beaverhill Blvd. was destroyed. Fire officials said while the flames didn’t tear through the twin building at 1081 Beaverhill to the same extent, it was so heavily damaged, it, too, was a write-off.

The cause of the fire remained under investigation Sunday and no estimate of damage had been released but it was expected to amount to millions of dollars.

Fire officials confirmed initial reports and said there were no injuries. That was likely due in part to a tenant, so far unnamed, who was credited for raising the first alarm.

“One tenant had the presence of mind to run down the hallways and knock on doors and alert other tenants to the smoke rather than just evacuating,” said Mark Reshaur, assistant chief of the Winnipeg Fire Paramedic Service, who spoke after the blaze, reported just before 6 a.m., was under control.

“It was brave and noble things to do,” Reshaur said.

Fire crews had the flames out by 7:40 a.m.

Two tenants who remained at the scene long after the flames were out said someone bounded down their hallways and banged on their doors as fire crews arrived. They don’t know who saved them but they got out of the building just before 6 a.m.

Both men, neither of whom wanted to give their names, escaped their apartments in the neighbouring building with the clothes on their backs. They didn’t have time to grab anything else, not even their cellphones, they said.

“I came out at 6 a.m. in the morning because someone was pounding on all the doors and I looked and I seen the flames coming out from the back of 1085,” one tenant said. “This is one of the worst days of my life,” he said.

A representative for the building owner, Ladco Co. Ltd., was called to the scene and said both buildings would be likely be rebuilt.

The buildings were built in 1978 and wooden roof trusses in the attics lit up like match sticks.

Some tenants left homeless were referred to the Red Cross, some were expected to move in with family and others with insurance were headed to hotels Sunday.

The blaze could be seen from blocks away. Residents in the neighbouring Windsor Park neighbourhood were drawn to the fire and a local Tim Hortons coffee shop sent over boxes of hot coffee for evacuees.

At the peak of the fire, there were 19 fire crews and four ambulances crowded into the side street off Beaverhill Boulevard.

“Crews declared it a working fire from a kilometre away. They were on Lagimodiere at Fermor headed to the scene when they saw the flames. I have no idea how high those flames were,” the assistant fire chief said.

“Crews searched the first and second floors and they managed to search most of the third floor (in the first building) before the flames took the roof and the roof started to collapse,” the assistant fire chief said. “We had to pull all our people out of the building.”

Fire crews fought the fire from an open field in the back, turning a massive hose called a gun onto the blaze in an effort to douse the flames.

“I can’t say enough about the professionalism of our crews who went into that building. They had a razor-thin margin and they pushed it. They held on, searching, until they had to be evacuated,” the assistant fire chief said.

alexandra.paul@freepress.mb.ca