Fire destroys downtown apartment
Firefighters worked all night fighting the flames
Evan Kiyoshi French
Northern News Services
Sunday, June 14, 2015
SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE
Flames engulfed a downtown Yellowknife apartment around 1:30 a.m. on Sunday.
A fireball explodes from a top-floor room at Polaris Apartments on the corner of 52 Avenue and 49 Street around 1:30 a.m. on Sunday. - Evan Kiyoshi French/NNSL photo
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Residents spilled into the rear parking lot of the three-storey Polaris building at the corner of 49 Street and 52 Avenue and watched as shattered glass and flames burst from the top-floor window of an apartment unit facing the parking lot.
Paramedics emerged from the front of the building and loaded what appeared to be a person on a gurney into an ambulance. The city did not comment on the extent of that person's injuries by press time.
Jonathan Zoe said he lives two doors down and on the opposite side of the hallway from the burning room.
He said he heard the fire alarms and noticed "lots of smoke in the hallway" as he made his escape. Zoe, carrying his one-year-old son, and his girlfriend stood behind a fence in the adjacent property and watched as members of the Yellowknife Fire Department arrived on scene to begin fighting the blaze.
"It's pretty messed up," said Zoe, slapping at mosquitoes and watching the flames.
Jonathon Wall and his mother, Vickie Francisco, said they were asleep in their first floor apartment when they awoke to the sound of a fire alarm.
Francisco said she noticed smoke in the hallways as she exited the building.
Watching the blaze from the rear parking lot, Francisco said she was aware of a couple of people who resided in the burning unit.
Flames burned through power lines above the burning window frame and several electrical explosions lit up the parking lot.
A pair of fire engines poured water over the flames while firefighters manned a hose below the window.
Firefighters continued to pour water onto the flames but by 3 a.m. an orange glow at the top of the building remained. Smoke and flames gushed from the eaves troughs all along the 49 Street side of the building.
Crews continued to fight the flames as the sun rose into the sky. By 9 a.m, a backhoe was at the scene pulling apart the roof as firefighters continued to douse the smoldering embers.
Later, Francisco said she and her son were put up at the Explorer Hotel along with some other tenants of the burned building.
Francisco said she was feeling "pretty shaken up," and was planning to attend a 1 p.m. meeting with other tenants at the Explorer Hotel.
City spokesperson Nalini Naidoo said Northern Properties is taking care of the residents of the building.
