Deadly fires: Risk of death, injury highest in Toronto's poor neighbourhoods
CBC
It was cold. That's the first thing Becca Young remembers about Jan. 15, 2022.
The second thing she remembers is the smoke from down the street billowing up into the sky.
A four-alarm fire had broken out in the three-storey rental building at 828 Shaw St. in Toronto, a few blocks south of her home. After firefighters put out the blaze, little remained of the structure that nearly 20 people called home.
Four residents were taken to the hospital, one with life-threatening burns. Once the fire was extinguished, the water from fire hoses and snow melted by the flames quickly froze in the -15 C weather.
"There was no ability to retrieve property or even to rescue some of the animals," she said.
Young, a community organizer, worked with one of her neighbours, Gloria Britstone, who led efforts to find places for tenants to stay, raise funds and collect donations of clothing and other necessities tenants may have lost in the fire.
But not everything can be replaced. Severe fires can be life-altering — but they don't affect all Torontonians equally.
The number of civilian injuries or deaths from fire incidents in the city's lowest-income ward was nearly five times greater than the highest-income ward, according to Toronto Fire Services (TFS) data from 2018 to 2022.
During that five-year period in Toronto, 76 residents died and another 566 were injured in fires. Firefighters were involved in an additional 97 fire-related injuries over the same time period.
In Ward 13, Toronto Centre, 52 residents died or were injured in fire incidents, more than any other ward in the city. Toronto Centre has a median household income of $65,000, the lowest of all 25 wards.
The ward with the highest median household income is Ward 25, Scarborough-Rouge Park, at $105,000. It saw 11 injuries and deaths from fires, tied with Eglinton-Lawrence for the second fewest.
There were some outlier communities, like Beaches—East York, which has a median household income of $89,000 — $5,000 more than the city overall — but the fourth highest number of resident injuries or deaths from fire: 38.
But a closer look at the ward shows income disparities exist within it.
The highest-earning 10 per cent of households make five times more than the lowest-earning 10 per cent.
