A fire in a Toronto high-rise apartment building has sent four people to hospital Saturday morning, including one person in critical condition.
Fire crews were called about the fire in a building at 275 Bleeker Street just after 10:30 a.m., said Toronto Fire Chief Jim Jessop.
When they arrived, firefighters encountered heavy flames and smoke on an upper floor of the building.
Jessop said it took firefighters quite some time to find the scene of fire before knocking it down. The heat was so intense that it melted some firefighters’ helmets, Jessop said.
Several people needed to be rescued from the building using aerial ladders outside the building.
Jessop said the three-alarm fire required significant resources.
“Not only were we fighting the fire, we were performing multiple exterior rescues as well as interior rescues while at the same time starting to ventilate smoke, and then concurrently responding to numerous 911 calls from people that were in their units where smoke was migrating in,” he said.
A spokesperson for Toronto Paramedic Services said they transported four people to hospital as a result of the fire Saturday morning, including three adults and one teen. One of the adult patients had critical, life-threatening injuries while the other three patients had serious but non-life threatening injuries, the spokesperson said.
Five police officers were also taken to hospital to be treated for smoke inhalation, Toronto police said in a post on X, formerly Twitter.
TTC buses have been brought in for residents who’ve been displaced by the fire while other residents are being asked to shelter in place while fire crews ventilate smoke from the building, Jessop said.
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