North York fire
One person injured, hundreds evacuated at North York building
One injured, hundreds evacuated in five-alarm blaze at highrise,
A five-alarm fire ravaged a highrise near Jane Street and Steeles Avenue West in North York on Friday evening, injuring one and forcing hundreds out of the building.
Flames and smoke seeped out of 235 Gosford Blvd., a15-storey building home to around 700 residents, for hours on Friday as roughly 100 firefighters took turns attempting to tame the blaze.
Nearly two dozen fire trucks were at the scene.
Chester Yim pulled into the parking garage of the apartment building shortly before 5:30 p.m. and messaged his family to let them know he was almost home.
A fire alarm started going off but he didn’t think much of it.
Three minutes later he was sprinting up 12 flights of stairs to the apartment where his wife and two kids, aged eight and 11, had been told to wait on the balcony while smoke poured into the unit.
Yim, 31, had stopped by his parents’ unit on the second floor before going up to his own apartment.
He was there when he got a call from his wife, who was in a state of panic.
“She said she had called 911 and they told her to remain in the unit,” he said. She told him they were on the balcony.
He ran down to the lobby and saw two fire trucks, firefighters and dozens of terrified people. Then he saw flames coming from the building. He heard that the fire might have started on the seventh or eighth floor.
“I just saw the flames. There was no time to mess around,” he said.
He knew he couldn’t leave his family stranded on a balcony. “I had the ability. I just went up to get them,” he said.
He ran up the stairs through smoke that was growing thicker. Once in the unit, he grabbed his family, half-dragging his wailing eight-year-old daughter back down the stairs.
They got to his parents’ apartment safely, though in a state of shock, Yim said in an interview from the second-floor balcony around 8:45 p.m.
“We are all here safe,” he said. “They’re OK now.”
Toronto fire Chief Matthew Pegg told reporters outside the building that the fire “escalated very quickly” and that the fire crews “encountered very significant fires on multiple floors and corresponding heavy smoke,” preventing them from getting the residents out quickly.
Floors seven to nine bore the brunt of the fire, according to Pegg. Six residents were rescued and removed by firefighters, with one transported to hospital in “stable condition,” Pegg said.
Mayor John Tory visited the scene and told reporters that the outcome was “a remarkable testament to the work of our first responders.”
Pegg said provincial fire investigators are working with Toronto Fire Services to determine the cause of the blaze and that they were doing everything they could to get residents back into their homes as soon as possible. The Driftwood Community Centre, about a kilometre from the building, was opened up to house the displaced residents.
The TTC sent roughly half a dozen buses to shelter the evacuees.
“I just saw the flames. There was no time to mess around.”
CHESTER YIM RESIDENT