Canada_ (Commonwealth) _ After a significant fire that tore through a historic building in Old Montreal on Thursday early, emergency personnel warned Saturday that at least seven individuals are still unaccounted for and might be trapped beneath the debris.
Martin Guilbault, the director of Montreal’s fire operations, said at a brief press conference held late Saturday night that personnel will start demolishing the structure on Sunday so that investigators could carry out their probe and identify the fire’s origin.
Initial reports from investigators indicated that one individual was thought to be missing following the incident. Nevertheless, Guilbault stated during an earlier press conference on Saturday that evidence recently corroborated from several sources led them to believe that additional victims were trapped inside when the fire broke out Thursday before 6 a.m. Charlie Lacroix, 18, is one among them, according to her grandpa, who talked to reporters on the scene on Saturday.
With tears, Robert Lacas recalled that the daughter was “beautiful and cheerful” as a little child. He said that what a police source informed him is all that he currently knows about what happened to his granddaughter. Lacas is requesting a safety examination of the structure. It’s not typical for someone to live in an apartment with only a door as a means of entrance, he added. It’s against the law, and you need two locations to flee.
According to a Montreal police spokeswoman, the police have not corroborated Lacas’s allegation and will not be verifying the identities of individuals who are missing out of respect for their families. Anybody searching for a missing individual who may have been inside the building is urged to call the police at 514-280-2222 or go to a nearby police station.
Three of the nine victims who were taken to the hospital on Thursday suffered significant injuries. Two people were still getting care in the burn unit as of Saturday. About 5:30 a.m., Alina Kuzmina and her partner were awakened by what they perceived to be an explosion inside one of the building’s Airbnb rental units.
On Sunday morning, a sizable crane was there as workmen started demolishing the building’s upper two levels. The three-story, 15-unit building at the corner of Place d’Youville and Saint-Nicolas Street has not yet been safe for firefighters to inspect inside. As a result, investigators are unable to identify the fire’s starting point.
