Suspicious fire at Vancouver building displaces 8 people

Vancouver firefighters respond to a suspicious blaze at a building on Main Street on Sept. 7, 2023.

A fire that appears to have been deliberately set outside of a Vancouver building Thursday afternoon quickly spread, displacing eight people.

Crews were called to the building on Main Street near National Avenue around 4 p.m. and quickly determined it had spread into the walls of the building, according to Vancouver Fire Rescue Services Chief Karen Fry.

"This fire has started on the outside of the building, is considered suspicious in nature, and we'll be investigating with Vancouver police," she said, adding that the building has 22 units but only eight residents.

The way the fire spread required crews to hack away at the exterior of the building with chainsaws and axes to stop further spread. The second-alarm fire drew a response that included between eight and 10 trucks and roughly 35 personnel, Fry said.

"These are really challenging. We've got this older infrastructure, the building (has) a lot of timber in the walls and sometimes it feels like you're chasing the fire a little bit to try and get it. But with technology such as thermal imaging cameras, and just really aggressive firefighting we seem to have knocked this fire down quickly," the chief explained.

No injuries were reported to the occupants or firefighters, Fry added, but the structural damage is still being assessed.

"Fortunately, everyone escaped this building, but we are going to have it assessed by our city engineering staff to ensure that it is safe," she continued. 

Last month, VFRS said it was being called to an unprecedented number of structure fires in the city, and Fry said that alarming trend is continuing.