Fire strikes tower

By Dan Hilborn
Published Jan. 22, 2005


A three-alarm fire forced the evacuation of a 26-storey highrise near Metrotown this week and, by the time the smoke cleared, two residents and two firefighters were taken to hospital with minor injuries.

The fire started in an eighth-floor suite of the building at 4390 Grange Ave. at about 1:15 p.m. Wednesday, said assistant fire chief Doug Hahn of the fire prevention office.

The blaze completely gutted the one suite and left the rest of the eighth floor uninhabitable. A preliminary estimate pegged the damage at $200,000 and that figure is expected to rise, Hahn said.

While the fire was relatively easy to contain, firefighters had a few tense moments as they used one stairwell to help residents make their escape and the other stairwell as their base of operations for fighting the fire.

"We had to escort a lot of people down the stairwells," said Hahn.

Several residents fled to the relative safety of their balconies, requiring firefighters on the ground to offer directions to their colleagues in the building to help locate the people who needed assistance.

The biggest problem occurred when smoke entered the stairwell that was being used as the base of operations. "We had to have smoke ejectors to pressurize the stairwells because crews on the ninth and 10th floors (above the fire) were having a tough time with the heat and smoke," he said.

The three-alarm fire required the services of about 50 firefighters on the scene, and the department issued a call-out to off-duty personnel to maintain staffing levels at all the fire halls in the city.

While the formal investigation into the cause of the fire has been delayed while firefighters deal with a potential asbestos concern, a preliminary review seems to indicate the fire was electrical in origin.

Hahn also noted that the building, which was constructed in 1971, did not have sprinklers. Only since 1998 has it been mandatory for highrises in B.C. to have sprinklers throughout, he said.