VANCOUVER Fire and Rescue Services said on Thursday that a preliminary investigation into the fire at Gastown’s Winters Hotel showed that the fire originated in a second floor unit from unattended candles and had been deemed accidental.

A total of five residents were rescued by firefighters and five were transported to hospital for care on Monday, April 11 when the building at 203 Abbott Street caught fire.

The fire was first detected by supervisory staff conducting a fire watch. They attempted to extinguish the fire but were unsuccessful in their efforts. They quickly transitioned to alerting the occupants in the building.

This building had a previous fire on Friday, April 8 in a different unit that was extinguished by the building sprinkler system. At that time, fire crews shut off the sprinklers and issued a Notice of Violation to have the fire life safety systems serviced. This notice requires a fire watch be put in place until the fire life safety system is back in operations. The notice of violation is a standard process when a sprinkler is activated, according to a statement.