Corner of downtown Ottawa parking garage looks to have collapsed
Parts of three floors and the west wall seem to have fallen or been removed from a downtown Ottawa parking garage overnight Tuesday into Wednesday.
Just before 5 p.m. Tuesday, a 911 caller noticed damage to a column on one of the pillars in the parking garage that spans from Slater Street to Laurier Avenue W. just west of O'Connor Street, Ottawa Fire Services said in a news release.
When firefighters arrived, they said they saw five to six girders in the building were bowing.
SEE ALSO: La Niña’s last hurrah? Pattern could disappear by this spring
Scott Lockhart, the city's deputy chief building official, told CBC News on Tuesday engineers believed the building was "at risk of imminent collapse" because of the large amount of snow piled on the roof.
A photo sent by someone working across the street from the garage suggests parts of its top two floors are gone. (Robin Sieders)
By 7 a.m. Wednesday, a piece of the upper west side wall was lying on the ground.
A photo from someone working in a building across the street shows parts of the garage's three upper floors seem to have collapsed, with a large pile of snow now on bottom floor.
It's unclear for now whether demolition crews on site were behind the changes, or if they collapsed on their own.
Street closed, vehicles stuck
Ottawa police have now closed Slater Street between Bank and O'Connor streets, plus the north side Laurier sidewalk.
DON'T MISS: Beware of carbon monoxide poisoning after a heavy snowfall
They had earlier said vehicles parked inside the parkade cannot be moved until further notice.
The four-storey garage stretches from Slater Street to Laurier Avenue W., about four blocks south of Parliament Hill. (Carlyn Matz)
City staff, police, and representatives from parking management firm Indigo, which runs the parkade, were near the building keeping people away and helping people who had vehicles inside Tuesday evening, including offering taxi chits.
Police said Tuesday evening no injuries have been reported.
The garage is four blocks south of Parliament Hill. The city's planning department signed off on a plan for a pair of apartment towers on that site last June.
This article was originally written for and published by CBC News, with files from Nathan Fung and Joseph Tunney.
Thumbnail image credit to Mateo Garcia-Tremblay/Radio-Canada.