2 dead due to carbon monoxide poisoning at a home in Gatineau, Que.

Two people in Gatineau’s Aylmer sector are dead due to carbon monoxide poisoning. CTV’s Natalie van Rooy reports.

Two people were found dead due to carbon monoxide poisoning at a home in the Aylmer sector of Gatineau, Que. Saturday evening, according to the city’s fire department.

The Gatineau Fire Department told CTV News firefighters received a call just after 7 p.m., reporting two people were found unresponsive inside a home on Wildfrid-Lavigne Boulevard.

When crews arrived at the scene, they detected carbon monoxide at the residence.

They then found the two unresponsive people. They were declared dead at the scene, firefighters say.

Firefighters say Gatineau police were allowed to enter the home after it was ventilated.

The city’s fire department says the cause of the carbon monoxide leak is unknown, yet.

Gatineau police told CTV News the incident has been deemed non criminal.

Police say when they arrived at the scene, a car was running in the garage.

The names of the victims will not be released awaiting an autopsy, police say.

In a news release Monday, police say the victims were an 83-year-old woman and a 78-year-old man, both residents of Gatineau.

The investigation is ongoing.

The news ‘hit us really hard’

Melissa Chevrier, a neighbour, told CTV News Ottawa the news “hit us really hard,” noting that she was close to the woman who lived in the house.

“Last night I had just come home from being out for a bit with the kids, and I had come home and I had seen that the garage door was open and that’s not normal. There’s a cop car outside. I had assumed he had just pulled someone over, because that frequently happens here. We’re close to the stop sign. So, I went to go over to remind her to close her garage door ... and the police officer stopped me and he says, no, you can’t go near the house,” Chevrier said.

“And I’m like, that’s odd. Okay. I said, we’re really close. So I just want to make sure that everything was okay. And he says I can’t say anything, but that’s it.”

Chevrier says she then received a phone call notifying of her death.

“She was like a grandmother, second grandmother to our children. She’d often bring gifts over for Christmas,” she said.

“We’d bring gifts to her. Her grandchildren came down to visit during the summer and our kids would often play together. They’re close in age... She would come tell us when the pool was ready and our kids would go over there. We would often have lunches or suppers together. She was like a guardian angel.”

Chevrier adds that the woman had been living by herself, noting that her family and friends frequently visited her.

“We know that it was carbon monoxide.” she said. “I figured it was that because, all the windows and the garage was open.”

With files from CTV News Ottawa’s Natalie van Rooy