A fire in Winnipeg’s West End sent smoke pouring out of a pharmacy on Ellice Avenue and Furby Street Friday morning.
Winnipeg fire crews had to evacuate a neighbouring building, but no one was hurt.
Crews were fighting a garage fire down the street around 4:00 a.m. when they were called to the scene. Police aren't ruling out a possible connection.
The fire caused a total of $750,000 in damage.
Firefighters put the blaze out within an hour, but the damage was already done.
"I started thinking, ‘It's a dream, or it's a reality? I'm walking in a dream,” said Mohammad Tariq, owner of Crestview Pharmacy.
Tariq has never experienced anything like this since opening 15 years ago.
"I was surprised,” he said. “First, I thought they were doing the clean-up crew, or something, but then when I noticed it. They were surrounding my pharmacy. So it was pretty bad actually. It's damaging."
Officials say garbage bins behind the pharmacy were lit on fire and pushed through a basement window.
"There was a fire located in the basement which extended to the second floor," said Don Black, District Four fire chief.
That's where medication and medical records were stored, now unusable.
The damage could have been much worse if fire crews weren't already responding to another call.
"We had report of a fire down the street,” said Black. “All of a sudden, while attending, they noticed that the pharmacy here was also on fire."
Police don't know yet if the two fires are connected, but Tariq isn't concerned about who did it. He just wants to take care of his patients.
"It'll take months. It's not going to be fixed right away, but mostly we are concerned about the patients in the neighbourhood, because it's a community pharmacy for their convenience."
Patients needing to fill their prescription are being redirected to other pharmacies.
- With a report by Rahim Ladhani
