Nanaimo’s firefighters had their training put to the test when a blaze broke out in a house along the waterfront this afternoon.
The alarm sounded shortly after noon Thursday, May 8, after employees at Sands Funeral Home reportedly heard a pop and saw smoke in the house on Newcastle Avenue located next door to the funeral home. A portion of the house is used by the funeral home for storage, but it is otherwise unoccupied.
Nanaimo Fire Rescue arrived to find smoke coming from the structure and immediately started a “defensive attack” upon learning the building had no occupants and because so much smoke had built up inside the structure that there was zero visibility.
“We had a five-engine response to this,” said Troy Libbus, Nanaimo Fire Rescue assistant chief of operations. “When the first engine pulled up there was heavy smoke. We heard there was an explosion. Upon arrival we saw the garage door was open slightly and we also got reports there was no one inside. It was a storage house.”
Libbus could not confirm that the fire started in the basement of the house, but Nanaimo Fire Rescue’s fire and loss prevention officer was on scene to begin the investigation into the cause of the fire, which quickly worked its way into the walls, soffits and roof of the house, eventually causing the roof to collapse.
“The fire was not located, so we call it a “vent limited” – we don’t know where the fire is and the house is full of smoke, and at this time when we saw [it was] up in the attic space and we heard and determined it was a storage house with no occupants inside, it became a defensive fire to keep our crew members safe.”
Sands Funeral Home staff and residents of an adjacent condominium building were advised to shelter in place, but were put on standby to evacuate in case the fire could not be contained to the house. However, Libbus said winds coming off Nanaimo Harbour worked in the firefighters’ favour to channel any smoke and flames between the structures and over Vancouver Avenue.
No injuries were reported and once the fire was knocked down with the help of one of the fire department’s aerial ladder trucks, which allowed firefighters to safely tackle the fire in the collapsing roof, it became a matter of rooting out and dousing hot spots in voids throughout the structure.
“We’ll keep trying to find void areas so we can get some water until we can stop the spread of the fire … and once we can stop the fire from growing, we’ll assess the situation to see if it’s safe to gain entry so we can get our primary search done,” Libbus said.
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— Chris Bush (@ChrisBushphotog) May 8, 2025
Nanaimo Fire Rescue, BC Ambulance on scene 25 Newcastle Ave for fire in home.
No word on occupants or injuries. More to come. pic.twitter.com/GsMMNos6JA
