An early morning house fire on Friday in West Vancouver left fire fighters battling the blaze for hours.
Martin Ernst, assistant fire chief with the West Vancouver fire and rescue, said at 1:29 a.m. on Dec. 27 firefighters were called to the 2600-block of Chelsea Court for reports of flames coming from the garage of a three-storey single family home.
“The first firefighters arrived on the scene to find more than just that, most of the house was involved in fire, so they immediately started a defensive attack, meaning they fought the fire from the outside,” said Ernst. “It was too dangerous to send any firefighters in.”
Ernst said they received confirmation from the West Vancouver police that there were no occupants inside the house at the time.
Ernst said firefighters worked for nearly four hours to battle the stubborn blaze and were still at the scene by early afternoon extinguishing hot spots. While the basement is still intact, the main floor and upper floor of the house were affected.
Ernst said the investigation is still in the early stages, but fire investigators will be interviewing witnesses to determine where the fire might have started. Police are also canvassing neighbours in the area for more information.
“There’s been a couple of fires before, first one accidental, second one cause unknown and this one we’re just going in to investigate over the weekend to determine a cause,” said Ernst. “As investigators we go in completely neutral and we look at the physical scene and attempt to find out where the fire started and then how the fire started.”
