A mother and her two young children died early Saturday when a fire broke out in their townhouse in northwest Toronto.
A fire in a townhouse in northwest Toronto killed a mother and two of her children on Saturday.
(CBC)
Firefighters managed to pull three other children from the burning home, which was engulfed in flames and filled with thick, black smoke. The 16-year-old girl and two boys, ages five and 12, are recovering in hospital from smoke inhalation and minor burns.
The blaze erupted at around 1:30 a.m. ET, and investigators have not yet determined how it started. The Ontario Fire Marshal's office said it could take several days to pinpoint the cause.
Officials have not released the victims' names, but neighbours said a single mother in her 30s died, along with her eight-year-old daughter and her son, who was three or four.
Their home was part of a public housing complex run by Toronto Community Housing. On Saturday afternoon, tearful friends and neighbours congregated by the charred townhouse, which is located near Keele Street and Sheppard Avenue.
"I'm honestly still in shock, it's just surreal to me, I can't believe it," said neighbour Simone Myles.
'She wanted to move'
Friends and neighbours said the mother had gone through difficult times recently. Her fiancé was shot to death last year.
"She said she wanted to move," said one of the victim's friends, Tammy, who did not provide her last name.
"She wanted to get out of this neighbourhood because it's ghetto. She wanted to get out of it, and now she dies in it?"
The fire spread through the townhouse but was contained to the one unit because of the firewalls separating the townhouses, Jim Fisher of the Ontario Fire Marshal's office said.
"There is a smoke alarm on both floors where they are legally supposed to be," he said.
Smoke alarms tested
Toronto Community Housing said it tests the smoke alarms in all its 58,000 low-income homes and apartments every year.
The alarms in the townhouse that burned down passed their last inspection and were hard-wired to notify Toronto Community Housing when they were not working, or tampered with, the housing organization said.
"We take life safety and our life safety systems very seriously," Steve Floros, director of property management, said. "It's a priority for us. If there's any report of a malfunction, we deal with it right away."
Toronto fire Chief Bill Stewart said the home didn't have a sprinkler system and he urged Ontario to make it a law that sprinklers be installed in homes.
Fisher urged people — at this time of year especially — to review their home safety systems.
"Take a minute now and check to see if your smoke alarm works. It's the only thing that stands between you living and perishing in a fire."
With files from the Canadian PressRelated
Video
- Aaron Saltzman reports for CBC-TV (Runs: 2:14)
- Play: Real Media »
- Play: QuickTime »
- CBC-TV's Susan Pedler talks to Ontario Fire Marshal investigator Jim Fisher (Runs: 3:40)
- Play: QuickTime »
- Play: Real Media »
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