PLUMAS, Man. — Two adults and a toddler are dead following a mobile home fire near a small Manitoba community.
RCMP say they and firefighters responded to the blaze early Friday night near Plumas, Man., about 175 kilometres west of Winnipeg.
Police say once the fire was extinguished, officers and fire personnel entered the home found the bodies of a 36-year-old man, a 28-year-old woman and a two-year-old girl.
They say all three lived in the home.
Police say four other children who also lived there were found safe at another location.
An autopsy has been scheduled and the Office of the Fire Commissioner is assisting with the investigation.
Fire Chief Gordon Coutts says the community is small and many residents casually knew the people who died.
“You just knew them to see them and that was it,” he says, adding the tragedy is “tough on everybody.”
“A lot of people are sad over it.”
Coutts adds that the four children who survived the fire were at school when it broke out.
Wayne Wright, a longtime resident who runs a local fabric shop called KickAss Country Store, says the town’s population is about 250 people.
He says he didn’t know the people who died but Plumas is quite transient, with some residents living there for only a couple years before moving on.
Wright adds there is no mobile home park in the community.