A backhoe propped up the badly damaged roof of a Dartmouth apartment building Monday as investigators examined burnedout units, trying to determine the cause of a weekend fire that killed one person, sent another to hospital and displaced about 150 tenants.
Halifax Regional Fire and Emergency crews responded to the blaze at 81 Primrose St. in the north end at 3:38 a.m. Saturday.
Firefighters used a ladder truck to rescue between 15 and 20 people, Deputy Chief Roy Hollett said.
Although all 80 units in the sprawling, T-shaped, four-storey building were evacuated, Hollett said the fire damage was confined to a handful of units on the third and fourth floors of one wing.
“What we need to find out is whether it started on the top floor and went down or started on the third floor and went up,” Hollett said at the scene Saturday morning. “There’s so much damage right now, it’s really hard to tell.
“Although the fire has been knocked down andcontrolled, we’re still doing searches. I just did a walk-through and there’s heavy damage in three apartments. Our next step now is to shore the building up with structural shoring and then we’ll do a safe, thorough search.”
On Monday, Hollett told reporters six to eight units were directly damaged by fire and many other apartments in that wing of the building suffered smoke and water damage.
Asked if investigators were close to figuring out the cause of the blaze, Hollett said, “It’s going to take a while.”
“I wouldn’t want to put a time or day on it,” he said. “Our focus is firefighter safety and investigator safety, and the police officers who are helping us, their safety.
“We’ll get through it in the time that we can.”
Hollett said he doesn’t know when residents will be allowed to move back into undamaged sections of the building, but a system has been worked out to allow tenants to retrieve some personal effects. Firefighters or Halifax Regional Police officers were expected to begin escorting tenants to and from their apartments Monday afternoon.
“We’re going to do everything we can to put some degree of normality back into their lives by giving them access to immediate effects that they can take out,” the deputy fire chief said.
“If we feel it’s not safe for them to enter, we will go in and get the items for them.”
Eighty-eight tenants registered with the Canadian Red Cross and most were staying with relatives, friends or at other accommodations, the Red Cross said in a news release Sunday.
Ten residents of the building spent Saturday night in an emergency shelter at the North Dartmouth Community Centre on nearby Highfield Park Drive.
On Saturday, Halifax Transit
buses were brought in to serve as comfort stations at the Primrose Street fire scene. Emergency volunteers with the Red Cross opened a reception centre at the Islamic Association of Nova Scotia mosque on nearby Leaman Street.
Red Cross teams interviewed tenants to determine emergency needs such as clothing, food and other essentials.
The Salvation Army assisted with meals and the Disaster Animal Response Team of Nova Scotia provided shelter for displaced pets. Hollett said four ladder trucks, six engines and three support vehicles were dispatched to the call, with as many as 60 personnel battling the fire at its peak.
While crews were fighting the Primrose Street blaze, another fire was reported in the neighbourhood at about 5:15 a.m.
That fire was less than a kilometre away at the corner of Brule Street and Pinecrest Drive, in a two-storey building that contains a former convenience store and a few apartments.
Hollett said the two fires were not related.
Five tenants registered with the Red Cross after being forced out by the Brule Street fire. Three of those tenants stayed with relatives or friends, the Red Cross said, and the other two spent the night at the emergency shelter at the community centre.
Meanwhile, back at 81 Primrose St., fire and police investigators on Monday appeared to be focusing on a third-floor apartment.
“They’re moving debris to see if there’s any evidence pointing to an origin and a cause,” Hollett said. “Of course, through all that, if they find anything else, they’ll report it.
“Right now, talking to the division commander and talking to the investigator, they’re not looking for a body.”
