Monday night’s blaze at an East Kildonan condo building under construction is highlighting some of the risks involved with construction sites.
“Certainly any fire on a construction site is a pretty scary event and yesterday’s was absolutely spectacular,” Winnipeg Construction Association president Ron Hambley told Global News.
“To see something that involved that quickly was really quite something.”
No one was injured in the incident and the cause of the fire is still under investigation.
“We’re very relieved that nobody actually got injured and nobody was hurt or killed in the fire,” Constriction Safety Association of Manitoba executive director Sean Scott said.
Winnipeg has seen similar construction site fires in recent years, including one on Pembina Highway near the University of Manitoba in 2019, and another at a Transcona condo building in 2020.
While arson was involved in one of those fires, industry experts say there are many factors that can put construction sites an an elevated level of risk, especially for wood-framed structures.
“Typically on a construction site situation there can be multiple sources of heat, flame or spark — everything from welding to grinding to using solvents to using a torch to perhaps (thaw) something that was frozen,” Hambley said.
“Particularly during construction, it’s a risky period of time certainly and the building itself isn’t protected by firewalls or fire barriers or fire-rated drywall or in some cases sprinklers — it’s a vulnerable time for a structure.”
The Construction Safety Association of Manitoba says it appears that proper emergency evacuation protocol was followed during Monday’s fire.
“Life safety is paramount and the number one thing to be concerned about,” Scott said.
“(It’s) important that nobody got hurt in this situation, and from my perspective, when I heard that emergency evacuation procedure was implemented and it actually worked.”
Scott says there will be a full incident investigation to determine the next steps.
“There will be an investigation by the contractor and/or that prime contractor to ensure or identify what happened and why and come up with the solutions of why it took over and prevent that from happening in the future.”