A fire call at an above-ground parking garage at University Hospital quickly became a criminal investigation.
At around 7:30 Saturday evening, emergency services reported to the area of Richmond and Windermere. At least five cars were on fire in the parking structure.
According to London Fire Platoon Chief Paul Carew, the fire was more serious than first reported.
“I had to call in more units; I had to call in more firefighters. We had to help people from the parking structure evacuate.”
In addition to numerous emergency personnel were over one hundred onlookers, including those who had parked in the structure and were waiting to get their vehicle.
Carew noted that London Police had sealed the building and were treating the area as a crime scene, so those who had been waiting for their cars were going to have to keep on waiting.
“As I said, this is a crime scene, my hands are tied. I’m not going to have a case thrown out of court because somebody wanted to get their car and they disturbed evidence and an arsonist goes free.”
The scene is secured by London Police, but those parked in the garage should be able to retrieve their vehicles after 4:30p.m. on Sunday.
Brandon works at University Hospital and first noticed last night’s fire when he finished his shift.
“As we came out the doors we just saw a bunch of smoke piling out. Police cruiser was sitting there, fire trucks everywhere. I didn’t see any flames but there was a lot of black smoke.”
Dan was going for a walk on Richmond Street when he first noticed the flames.
“Seen all the black smoke coming out of the front… I’ve never seen something like that in my life.”
Platoon Chief Carew echoed Dan’s sentiments, telling AM980 he had never seen an incident like this in his career.
“To show you how serious this incident was, that’s Truck 6,” Carew pointed towards the largest fire truck on scene, “it is a thousand gallons a minute. We don’t unlimber that unless things are getting kind of serious. We actually wound up using two radio frequencies the incident was getting so big.”
No one was injured and damages were initially estimated to be between $50,000 and $75,000.
There are no suspects at this time and the Fire Marshall should arrive on scene today.
Anyone with information is asked to contact London Police or Crime Stoppers.
