Fatal fire rips through Quebec senior home

A fire raged through a seniors' home in eastern Quebec on Thursday trapping terrified residents, most of them dependent on wheelchairs and walkers. Eight died and 27 were missing according to local media, and Canada's prime minister said there is little doubt the death toll will be higher. 

Officials said firefighters saw and heard people they were unable to rescue from the building but about 20 residents were transported from the building to safety.

Most residents were older than 75, and 37 of them were older than 85. The building included both single rooms and apartment-style dwellings.

Acting mayor Ginette Caron said many of those unaccounted for were confined to wheelchairs and walkers. Only five residents in the center were fully autonomous and some had Alzheimer's disease, she said.

Thick ice covered the remains of the collapsed building Thursday night, hampering the search for the missing, said Quebec Provincial police Lt. Guy Lapointe. Searchers will resume looking for the missing at daylight.

"We can keep some hope for those unaccounted for, but there's very little doubt that the loss of life is considerable," said Prime Minister Stephen Harper.

The fire in the Residence du Havre broke out around 12:30 a.m. Thursday in L'Isle-Verte, a small town of 1,500 people about 140 miles northeast of Quebec City. More than 50 people lived at the 52-unit complex that included a social agency, a pharmacy and a hair salon.

Several fire departments in the region were called in to help extinguish the blaze, which completely destroyed the building.

Outside the building, Jacques Berube, 70, was getting ready to hear the worst about his 99-year-old mother, who is blind but still mobile.

"I went near the building; the corner where her room was is burned," he said. "I'll just have to wait and see. I don't like it. But I don't have any choice. It's just reality."

Pierre Filion, who had a cousin and an aunt living in the residence, said the tragedy had shaken the tightly knit community.

"Everybody knows everybody," he said. "It's a small community. It's going to take a long time to start living normally."

Filion said his two missing relatives who lived there were both in their 70s.

"I went there 15 minutes ago and the only thing we saw was smoke and smoke," he said.

Parts of the complex, which opened in 1997, had sprinklers, while others didn't. There were smoke detectors in every room and in the building itself. A Quebec Health Department document updated last July said the three-story building, with one elevator, was constructed entirely of wood.

The local fire chief said sprinklers did go off, triggering the fire alarm and allowing firefighters to gain access to about one-third of the building.

Quebec provincial police Sgt. Ann Mathieu urged people who have any information on people considered missing to call police.  

Mario Michaud, who lives across the street from the building, said he witnessed the unfolding drama shortly after midnight.

"The fire had started on the second floor. I woke up my girlfriend and called 911. I saw the firefighters and they got to work. A woman on the second floor was shouting, and she went out on to the balcony. Her son went to get a ladder, but he couldn't get to her. She burned to death," Michaud told local newspaper Info Dimanche.

Pascal Fillion, who lives near the seniors' home, said rescuers felt helpless against a fast-moving blaze with smoke so thick it was nearly impossible to approach the building.

"People tried to do whatever they could, but the fire was so intense that there wasn't much that could be done," he said. "I saw people crying; I saw people collapse, because they were watching those people burn."

The fire comes just six months after 47 people were killed in Lac-Megantic, Quebec, when a train with 72 oil tankers derailed and exploded in the small community.

In 1969, a nursing home fire in the community of Notre-Dame-du-Lac, Quebec, claimed 54 lives.

Al Jazeera and The Associated Press