CAMPBELL RIVER, B.C. – A fire on Perkins Road is being treated as suspicious.
Campbell River Fire Chief Thomas Doherty said “Our investigators are working with RCMP.”
Doherty said the Campbell River Fire Department got the call just after 11:30pm Saturday about a fire in the 1700 block.
When crews arrived, they could see fire and smoke on the property that is set back from the road.
A fire had started at a small tent camp set up on the property’s yard.
Doherty said the fire had spread to the adjoining cabin on the property.
“It burned up the outside of the structure and into the roof space,” Doherty said.
He estimated that the single-storey cabin was roughly 40 feet by 60 feet in size.
Doherty said the fire spread through the grass to a nearby tree and started burning into the grass on a neighbouring property.
“We got there in time to knock that down,” he said.
It only took a few minutes for firefighters to put out the fire.
Four firefighters were deployed in the initial truck and a second truck arrived later, carrying five more firefighters.
“This one was pretty much taken care of with the four-person crew,” Doherty said.
Deck fire
Cigarette material is believed to be the cause of a house fire at the south end of Campbell River late his morning.
Doherty said at about 11:30am, crews responded to a fire at 143 Lennea Place.
The homeowner put the fire out with an extinguisher before crews arrived.
Doherty said the suspected cause is a “poorly discarded cigarette material in a combustible container” on the second-floor deck.
“(It) burned the deck and then dropped down and started a fire on the lower deck as well,” he said.
Crews mopped up the hotspots to make sure the fire didn’t ignite again.
