Cleanup after Dunbar fire and crane collapse could take up to 3 weeks, says city

The City of Vancouver says it is making progress on cleaning up the Dunbar-Southland neighbourhood after a construction fire led to the collapse of a crane earlier this week.

Chief building official Saul Schwebs tells 1130 NewsRadio they removed unstable remnants of the burnt building Saturday morning, and he says they are still planning the best way to remove the crane.

“What we did today was just a very limited demolition to remove a couple of portions of the building remaining and the scaffolding to the north of the site,” Schwebs told 1130 NewsRadio.

“Those have now been knocked down, and so the site is quite a bit stabilized. By the end of the day, once we get rid of a couple more hazard trees, the two families to the north of the site will be able to return home, so we will have everybody home, except for the three houses that were more severely impacted by the fire.”

On Tuesday evening, a fire in a six-storey wood-frame building under construction in the neighbourhood led to the collapse of a nearby crane, according to officials. During the collapse, the crane took down power lines and trolley wires. It also caused a gas line to rupture and catch fire, but crews were able to get that under control. The incident caused damage to several homes in the area.

Schwebs says that even after the portions of the building are removed Saturday, the crane will likely remain in place for another couple weeks.

“There’s a few people involved, including the contractor, the property owner, WorkSafe BC, Technical Safety BC, so they have kind of an idea of what they want to do, but they’re still going to take some time to generate the plan,” he said.

“It’s a very unusual situation, as you can imagine. They’re treating it as a demo operation, a demolition operation, rather than a salvage operation, which will speed up the timelines.”

Schwebs says after the crane is removed, there will still be more work to complete the cleanup.

“The City of Vancouver and Coast Mountain Bus Company are going to need a little bit of time, up to a week, I’m told, to repair some of the damage to the infrastructure as a result of the crane falling on it,” he said.

“And then also BC Hydro is going to have some work to do along 41st to restore power to remaining homes. They’re still out because those wires were taken down by the crane as well.”

Miranda Myles with the City of Vancouver’s Emergency Management, says in the meantime, there will some closures in the area.

“There’s fencing up in place now, so that will help keep people in the right places,” she said.

“We also want to ensure that the businesses that are here nearby, are also able to be accessed.”

Road closures are expected to affect the area for weeks to come.

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