A stubborn blaze that slammed several commercial units on St. Hubert near St. Zotique Thursday has left a trail of damage that goes beyond material loss.
Lynsey Billing, whose Scream Dance Academy was badly damaged by the smoke, flames and water, said the development is “her worst nightmare.”
Billing - who is uninsured - said she recently invested $10,000 into renovating the dance school, which she has been operating for four years.
“My life is in this building. This is my art, this is my life’s work,” she told CTV Montreal Thursday. “This is beyond any nightmare, short of somebody dying.”
A generous neighbour has offered Billing space for a few weeks while she tries to find another location for her school.
Billing said that she’s summoning all of her resolve to cope.
“I thought of this phrase last night before I went to bed and i thought it was very fitting for a dance school. The show must go on. We're trying to remain positive.”
The fire started in the basement of a hair-care products store, which was closed at the time. It coincided with a city operation that used electricity to defrost an underground pipe, although there it’s not known whether that procedure caused the fire.
An adjacent gown store was also heavily-damaged by the fire.
“It’s the biggest week of the year, it’s March Break and the boutique was full,” said merchant Mohamed Bessouda, Owner of Prestige DB. “I smelled something, I thought it was nothing then I saw smoke along the floor.”
Bessouda then saw smoke emanating from an electrical panel. “I got everybody to leave and called 911 and 10 minutes later the firefighters were there.”
The firefighters were there for most of the day Thursday as the heavy smoke and risk of collapse prevented them from advancing very far into the building.
