All seven bodies of victims from Old Montreal fire recovered, five total officially identified
The bodies of all seven of the victims of the March 16 Old Montreal fire have now been recovered and four more identities made public by the coroner’s office.
“Following positive identifications, the permanent coroner in charge of the investigation, Géhane Kame, confirms the identification and the death of the last four victims that were extracted from the rubble,” said Montreal police inspector David Shane on Monday afternoon at the site of the Place d’Youville building.
The four victims identified include: An Wu, 31, friends Saniya Khan, 32, and Dania Zafar, 32, and Nathan Sears, 35.
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The first victim was identified officially last week as Camille Maheux, 76.
The family of Charlie Lacroix, 18, identified her as one of the victims of the fire as well.
“The families were informed by the investigators prior to this press briefing,” added Shane. “We will not provide further details on the origin of the victims and the circumstances surrounding their death out of respect for their families and loved ones.”
The sixth and seventh bodies found in the rubble on Monday morning. The bodies have been sent to a pathologist for identification as crews continue their work on the site. Authorities continue to say they do not believe any other victims are in the rubble.
“Today we will continue will continue to search the rubble with the help of a dog handler to ensure that there are no other victims. As mentioned on Friday, at this stage of the investigation, we can reaffirm that apart from the seven people who are initially missing, we have no information indicated that additional victims are in the rubbles,” said Montreal fire operations chief Martin Guilbault.
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The update comes after a fifth body was recovered on Saturday.
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Some of the victims had rented units in the building on Airbnb, which was prohibited from allowing hosts to rent short-term rentals in the area due to a city bylaw.
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Airbnb has since announced it would remove all listings in Quebec from its platform that don’t have a permit from the province.
The cause of the fire is still under investigation.
“So you got different possible causes. The obvious ones that you ask us questions about are the criminal ones,” said Shane. “So it could be criminal intention, Somebody lighting the fire. It could be part of negligence. But usually most of the time it’s involuntary. Whether it being a smoker, you know, something that has to do with somebody smoking, it can also be kitchen, like cooking or cooking or electrical cause. So those are all types of causes that are possible. When we took charge of the case more than a week ago, we started with a broad vision of all possible causes and as we go further, we will be able to to identify the cause. We’re working hard on that.”
The fire department says they’ve gone door to door to check fire safety in many of the older buildings in the area.
Montreal’s official opposition leader, Aref Salem, says the city needs to step up.
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“First of all, when you submit a permit, the city has to make sure that the permit is right before delivering the permit. The plans are right before they give the permit,” Salem. “The second thing, when you send inspectors, there’s a follow up to do and what I’m hearing right now, there was no follow up done and it’s really dangerous.”
“We had the tragedy basically to know that there is things in the city that’s not done the right way,” he added.
