Squatters may have been sheltering in an abandoned Surrey barn before it burned down Tuesday night.
Assistant Surrey Fire Chief Chris Keon said nobody was injured in the single-alarm fire, in the 14000-block of 60A Avenue. It was called in at about 7:50 p.m. and firefighters put it out in within half an hour.
“It took no time at all,” Keon said. “It was fairly routine for us.”
Neighbours told a freelance photographer for Black Press Media that the RCMP had been there a few hours before the fire broke out.
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Is the cause suspicious?
“I think they are going to perform an investigation on it, the RCMP requested one, but that would be ongoing still,” Keon said.
Surrey RCMP Corporal Elenore Sturko said Wednesday she could find no record of police being on scene before the fire broke out.
“Some of the information we had is there may have been squatters there attempting to warm up,” Sturko said.
“We got lots of multiple calls of the fire, attended, didn’t find anybody injured or anything like that, didn’t see anybody around. Information collected as a part of our attendance was that the barn may have been used by people who are trying to warm up, but no one was located by us when we went there.”
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