Roof collapses on 24-hour supermarket in Terrebonne, Que.
It was the suddenly-appearing cracks in the ceiling of the 24-hour Metro Plus supermarket in Terrebonne, Que., that alarmed the six employees on duty just before midnight Sunday.
They called the fire department, only to have their suspicions confirmed. The roof was in imminent danger of collapse.
Twenty minutes later, a third of the roof caved in, but by then the employees were safely outside.
There were no customers in the store on Moody Boulevard at the time.
Firefighters evacuated the Metro supermarket on Moody Boulevard in Terrebonne, Que., just before its roof collapsed Saturday evening. (Pascal Robidas/CBC)
The city's fire chief Sylvain Dufresne said the roof collapse also broke a water pipe, which subsequently flooded the store.
It was the accumulation of snow, ice and water that likely caused the collapse, he said.
The supermarket is closed to shoppers as owners of the business assess the damage.
That collapse was the second in Terrebonne. Earlier Sunday evening, the roof on a vacant commercial building collapsed.
In that case, firefighters smelled gas and shut electricity off to the area, but nobody was injured.
This article was originally published on CBC.ca with files from Radio-Canada