All but 1 resident accounted for after fire destroys building in Vancouver's Gastown area
CBC
All residents but one have been accounted for after a serious fire destroyed much of a historic building in Vancouver's Gastown area on Monday.
Atira Women's Resource Society, which manages single-room occupancy (SRO) housing in the upper floors of the Winters Hotel building, said officials hope to confirm the final tenant's whereabouts on Tuesday.
"It's a tenant that is often away, so hopefully we will track that person down today," said Janice Abbott, Atira's CEO.
More than 70 people lost their homes and belongings after fire ripped through much of the brick building on Abbott Street near Water Street for hours on Monday. Abbott said some residents had lived in the building for more than 15 years.
"People lost everything, obviously," Abbott said.
Five people were taken to hospital, including two in serious condition and one in stable condition. One of the people who was hurt had jumped from a window to escape the flames, fire crews said.
Others were treated for minor injuries at the scene.
The heritage building houses a number of businesses, including The Flying Pig restaurant, Lemongrass House, Nika Design and the Australian Boot Company shoe store.
Abbott said there was a fire inside an SRO resident's room in the building as recently as last Friday, which activated the sprinkler system.
"It was tenant related," Abbott told CBC's The Early Edition on Tuesday. "Fires and floods are not particularly unusual in the building, given who we house."
Abbott said the building is inspected by the city and the fire department several times a year. She said, to her knowledge, the building was last cleared of violations after the last check around October.
"This was a fairly quiet building and a building that was in fairly good shape, [but] it was, however, built in 1910 or earlier," she said.
Vancouver Fire Chief Karen Fry confirmed Monday the building had recently been inspected and it had a sprinkler system, but she didn't know if the sprinklers were working when the fire broke out.
By nightfall Monday, part of the building's roof had collapsed and fire crews were focused on preventing the fire from spreading to other buildings.
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