Patrons of Saaz will be able to enjoy the restaurant’s south Indian cuisine again, perhaps as early as June 30, an owner said Wednesday.
Co-owner Raj Gupta said building assessors and insurance adjusters are only beginning to look over the fire and water damage, estimated at $150,000. But Gupta said Saaz, at 535 Yates St., near Wharf Street, could reopen as early as the end of the month if damage is not too extensive and repairs and renovations can be completed.
Nobody was injured. The cause of the fire remains under investigation.
Gupta said he has received a number of calls from people sad to the hear news of the fire. “Hopefully, everything will come back,” he said.
The fire broke out just after 11 p.m. Monday, after the restaurant, which opened in 2013 and specializes in the cuisine of southern India, had closed for the night.
Price’s Alarms alerted firefighters to an alarm on the premises, while someone called 911 reporting possible flames. Victoria police also advised the fire department of flames seen from the rear of Bastion Square. Firefighters arrived and broke down a nearby door, smashing out the glass.
The restaurant’s sprinklers had activated and kept the fire contained, said Battalion Chief Dave Bicknell, and firefighters were able to extinguish the flames within minutes. The fire started in an area used as a busing station and for storage, he said. According to the Victoria Fire Department, the fire began in an area used as a busing station and for storage.
A few hours after the Saaz blaze, a small fire was reported at 701 Esquimalt Rd., across from Dalton Street in Vic West. Victoria firefighters responded about 3 a.m. to the report of smoke in the building. Upon arrival, crews found light smoke in the basement and the ground floor of the apartment building. It turned out a chair in a common area of the basement had been smouldering.
The apartment’s manager discovered it and moved it to the rear parking lot. Fire crews removed the smoke with fans. Residents were able to return to their suites once the smoke had cleared.
Police are seeking a male suspect in relation to a suspicious fire that targeted the Centre métropolitain de chirurgie in the Ahuntsic-Cartierville borough in Montreal, the only medical clinic in Canada that offers gender reassignment surgery.
Firefighters were alerted to a fire at the clinic at 8:44 p.m. Monday. About 20 firefighters rushed to the scene, but the fire was extinguished by an automatic sprinkler system. The fire was in an operating room, according to Montreal Fire Prevention Service spokesperson Mélanie Drouin. There were a few staff members and patients in the building at the time but they got out before firefighters arrived.
Drouin said damages are estimated by fire department officials at about $700,000. Medical equipment was damaged by water and smoke, she said. The clinic provides a variety of plastic surgeries and body surgeries, including breast augmentation or reduction, facelifts, liposuction and gender reassignment surgery (GRS).
The news spread quickly among members of the transgender community in Montreal and across Canada. Some are concerned that the fire will exacerbate the already lengthy waiting periods for gender reassignment surgery at the clinic. There is also speculation as to whether the clinic was targeted because it offers GRS.
“It would certainly seem relevant that the arson targeted the only clinic in Canada that currently provides GRS and other trans-related surgeries — especially at a time when things are becoming increasingly polarized on trans issues,” said Mercedes Allen, an advocate for transsexual and transgender communities in Alberta who writes on equality, human rights, LGBT and sexual minority issues in Canada.
“Something like this is certainly not going to help a community that already feels targeted. I also hope for the sake of the surgeons and staff that they too won’t have to start living in fear of violence. However, I’d also want to be careful not to be too quick to assume that this is hate-motivated,” Allen said.
Constable Manuel Couture, a Montreal police spokesperson, said investigators are aware of the services offered by the clinic, but had not, to his knowledge, classified the fire as a suspected hate crime by Tuesday afternoon.
“I don’t have any information right now to indicate that this was some kind of hate crime, but investigators are aware of that and as soon as they have the slightest suspicion that something could be a hate crime, they transfer it to the Hate Crimes Unit,” Couture said.
“This is devastating for trans health care,” Sophia Banks, a Montreal-based photographer and trans-rights advocate told the National Post. “People are freaking out” about wait times and how long the clinic will be closed. She said they’re also concerned about why this happened
Reporting on lives and property saved by fire sprinklers
