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[UPDATE] Two-alarm blaze rips through South Burnaby home

The smell of smoke lingered in the air as fire investigators from the Burnaby Fire Department prepared to enter a burnt-out home on Neville Street between MacPherson and Plum avenues.

The smell of smoke lingered in the air as fire investigators from the Burnaby Fire Department prepared to enter a burnt-out home on Neville Street between MacPherson and Plum avenues.

Less than 10 hours earlier, it was a much different scene at 5658 Neville Street. Firefighters were called to the house around 12:30 a.m. on Aug. 22 when the two-storey residence caught fire. The blaze spread throughout the home, causing damage to nearly the entire structure, Burnaby fire investigator Joe Tylor told the NOW on Friday morning.

"The main thing is everybody got out OK. So now we're just dealing with the investigation and working with the insurance company," he said.

When firefighters arrived on scene, Tylor said their priority was getting the family of four and a basement tenant out of the home right away. Once that was taken care of, firefighters went to work containing the two-alarm blaze before it spread to the homes on either side. In the quiet South Burnaby neighbhourhood, the homes are very close together and the chance of the fire spreading was a real possibility. Tylor credits the quick response from firefighters as to why the fire didn't jump to the homes next door.

"Once all the people were out, they were protecting the other two houses," he said. "There is some minor damage to the vinyl siding on the two houses, but they made that a priority so the other houses were protected."

Despite little damage to surrounding residences, the house itself was badly damaged. Much of the roof has collapsed and inside there is little that wasn't burnt or destroyed by the blaze.

"There's damage throughout the entire home. It was a significant fire," Tylor said.

Tylor added that he and another fire investigator will spend several hours inside the home to determine what caused the fire and whether or not the home can be restored.

"There's significant damage to the roof," he said. "Once we're done our investigation, the insurance company will have an assessment of whether the house can be restored or whether it'll have to be a tear-down or not."

As of Tuesday, Aug. 26, fire investigators were still trying to determine the cause of the blaze.

Assistant fire chief Greg Mervin told the NOW, investigators don't believe the cause to be anything suspicious and are looking into several different possibilities at this time.

The cause of the blaze is expected to be release later this week or early next week, Mervin added.