Langside Street building likely to be demolished after ongoing fire extinguished, official says

Winnipeggers are being asked to avoid an area of downtown Winnipeg near the University of Winnipeg as fire crews tackle an all-day blaze at a two-storey Langside Street building.

The Winnipeg Fire Paramedic Service said Wednesday the building — a mixed-use complex which isn’t believed to have been occupied at the time of the fire — was emitting heavy smoke and flames, and was unsafe for fire crews to go inside.

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Assistant fire chief Scott Wilkinson told 680 CJOB conditions have made it difficult for fire crews to tackle the fire from the inside, so they’ve been working for the bulk of the day to battle the flames from the exterior.

“They’re making good progress,” he said.

“They’ve managed to keep it from spreading to buildings that are adjoining it, which is great, but it’s been a major operation — and great work by the crews in very difficult freezing conditions.”

Wilkinson said there are concerns the building could collapse as a result of the fire, so firefighters are taking precautions.

“We will have to be looking at options of demolition in order to make that safe and to prevent a collapse,” he said.

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Wilkinson said no one was hurt in the blaze, although some firefighters were minorly banged up as a result of the heavy workload in icy conditions.

One of the building’s tenants, the West End BIZ, now has to scramble to keep its operations afloat without a home base.

“It’s been a lot of phone calls — making calls to our stakeholders, to insurance, connecting with our staff, making sure that our staff is armed to keep going, said Joe Kornelsen, the BIZ’s executive director.

“With the pandemic on, we’ve been doing a lot of online work, so in some respects, staff can keep working in serving our members while we also have to redeploy some resources to get back out ahead.

The West End community is a fabulous community for supporting one another working together — folks have been reaching out to me all day. We have definitely felt like there’s a community supporting us through this.”

Crews are expected to be on-scene for an extended period of time, which means Portage Avenue has been closed to traffic in both directions.

The cause of the fire will be under investigation.

1:08 Winnipeg needs stronger fire prevention program