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A major fire in a building on St-Hubert Plaza had hundreds of firefighters on the scene and the street closed to traffic for hours on Thursday.

Firefighters brought the four-alarm blaze under control at about 7 p.m. but Richard Bourdeau, chief of operations for the Montreal fire department, said crews would remain on the job for much of the night to make sure it did not surge out of control again.

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Part of the facade collapsed about 5:45 p.m. and structural experts were on the scene to make sure firefighters’ safety was not at risk, he said.

The fire started in the basement of 6596 St-Hubert St., a commercial building between Beaubien and St-Zotique Sts. Firefighters got the call at 10:52 a.m., from the owner of Prestige DB, a store that sells evening gowns on the ground floor, the fire department said.

When firefighters arrived, it was declared a four-alarm fire and more than 100 firefighters were dispatched to the scene. At one point, the ground floor started to sag and firefighters had to retreat and rethink their approach, operations chief Pierre Arsenault said. Three hours later, they still weren’t able to access the flames in the basement.

As of 7:45 p.m. there were still 80 firefighters fighting the blaze.

Around 4 p.m. the ground floor collapsed. The two top floors, which housed a dance studio and an office, were also heavily damaged. Five surrounding businesses were evacuated.

The cause of the blaze is unknown, but early reports said that an attempt to thaw frozen pipes started the fire. Although there were people thawing pipes in the morning, it’s still too soon to establish the link, Arsenault said.