A cigarette butt was the cause of a fire that shot flames 10 metres in the air after erupting in a storage area behind the Noodle Box restaurant in Victoria last Saturday night.

“It would appear the cause is smoking materials,” said Victoria fire inspector Megan Sabell. “It could have come from anywhere. It’s considered accidental.”

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The fire behind the Southeast Asian noodle bar, at 624 Fisgard St, broke out at about 7:30 p.m. It started in a chicken coop that had been reinforced with plywood siding and was used for storing tools and paint.

“Things were able to get underneath it and so we were able to find cigarette butts underneath it on the north side where our area of origin was,” Sabell said.

There was a smoking area behind the restaurant and a receptacle with water to dispose of smoking materials. Next door, there was also an outdoor table with an ashtray. “It was an area where people did gather and smoke,” Sabell said.

The general area was used by restaurant employees, residents of the adjacent apartments and others.

When the fire started, ground-floor resident Darcy Merrick said he smelled something strange and got up. He saw smoke and followed it around the corner and saw flames.

Merrick grabbed a fire extinguisher and pulled the pin but, as he went to spray the canister, there was an explosion. Others reported hearing a blast.

“It threw me back six feet to the ground,” Merrick said. “I gave up and I just went to Noodle Box and shouted ‘Fire, call 911.’ ” Merrick, who has military firefighting training, was left with scrapes to his knee. Paramedics bandaged his leg.

The explosion that threw Merrick to the ground could have come from any number of fuel sources, Sabell said. In the storage area were spray cans, butane and other combustibles. “There were a few things that were volatile in there.”

“That could have attributed to that whomp,” she said.

However, the area behind the restaurant was orderly and garbage was well-contained, which helped firefighters access the blaze and it ensured there was nothing else fuelling the flames, Sabell said.

There was smoke and soot damage to the restaurant and water damage to at least one neighbouring ground-floor brick apartment, Sabell said.

Victoria Fire Battalion Chief Jeff Zigay estimated the damage at about $50,000.

It is considered fortunate that the fire was contained to the north, back end of the building, and didn’t spread to the south, front end of the restaurant facing Fisgard Street, Sabell said.

The Noodle Box is a Victoria success story, having grown from a street-vendor cart. It now has four locations in Victoria, and more in Langford, Sidney and Nanaimo, and has expanded into Vancouver and Calgary.

The Fisgard restaurant is closed because of fire damage but is expected to reopen Saturday, according to an answering machine.

charnett@timescolonist.com