TWO Winnipeg firefighters died Sunday night after they were seriously injured inside a burning house in St. Boniface.
Neighbours said they saw two firefighters covered in soot pulled from the house at 43 Place Gabrielle Roy. At least four firefighters were rushed by ambulances to hospitals.
"We have two firefighters who've died," Alex Forrest, union president with the United Fire Fighters of Winnipeg, confirmed late Sunday through tears. "We have others who are injured... some seriously."
Forrest, who had the grim task of identifying the bodies, met with some members of the victims' families around 9:30 p.m.
He asked the Free Press not to immediately identify the dead firefighters because some members of their families had not yet been told.
Two firefighters remain in "very rough shape," he said.
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The deceased men, both captains with almost 30 years each on the job, were searching for people possibly stuck in the home when they were hit by a flashover -- a sudden burst of flames and extreme heat.
"They were all inside the house on a search. Some were hurt during the initial flashover and the others were hurt during the rescue," Forrest said.
"This is a very sad day for the city of Winnipeg."
The owner of the house, Richard Chartier, is reported by neighbours to be out of Canada with his wife, Liza Maheu, on a cruise vacation, and due to return this week. Chartier is a justice in the provincial court of appeal for Manitoba, said neighbours.Maheu is the executive director of a francophone arts organization.
The cause of the fire was not known last night.
"I don't know what happened," Rick Vandekerkhove, an official with the fire commissioner's office, said at about 9 p.m.
A neighbour said he was returning to his own home from an outing when he smelled smoke and saw flames coming from the Chartier garage.
The neighbour looked across the street to see a young man rushing from the house while speaking on his cellphone.
The fire spread rapidly, said the neighbour.
"The house is toast," said the neighbour, who asked that his name not be used.
Sara Scaletta, 16, who lives on the street, said she felt sick to her stomach when she saw the condition of two firefighters pulled from the two-storey home in severely burnt clothing.
"They were covered in black... one guy was convulsing," said Scaletta.
"There were people running everywhere," she said.
At least eight pumper trucks sat back-to-back along Place Gabrielle Roy, with fire hoses clogging up the small cul-de-sac where thick grey smoke poured from the roof of the house. Water quickly turned to ice in the -39 C cold.
The young man who reported the fire sat in a police cruiser car at the scene Sunday night, his hair mussed and face moist.
His teenage sister had also been in the house, but left to pick up a movie, said a teenage friend who had spoken to her by cellphone.
The sister was taken by officials into a nearby home on the street.
One of the deceased firefighters worked at Station 1 at the corner of McDermot Avenue and Ellen Street, while the other worked at Station 2 at the corner of Watt Street and Nairn Avenue.
The last firefighter to die on the job happened in 1989 when a member was killed in a collision while en route to an emergency, Forrest said.
"It's the worst imaginable feeling when a family sees a number of firefighters arriving at their door with the news," Forrest said. "It's a nightmare for the families who have lost a husband or father."
gabrielle.giroday@freepress.mb.ca
jason.bell@freepress.mb.ca
