Woman critically injured in blaze at south London apartment building

One woman was rushed to hospital with life-threatening injuries Wednesday following an apartment fire in south London.

Fire officials responded to a blaze at 140 Langarth St. W., a low-rise apartment building west of Wharncliffe Road South, around 8:30 a.m.

Although there was nothing visible from outside the red-brick structure when crews first arrived, platoon Chief Gary Mosburger said they battled thick smoke and zero visibility inside a single unit on the second floor.

There was a “very small amount of actual fire mostly contained to the unit itself,” he said.

Police said a woman was taken to hospital from the scene and remains in critical condition.

The Office of the Ontario Fire Marshal has been called in to probe the circumstances of the blaze, and a damage estimate hasn’t been made yet.

“There were detectors that were sounding within the building,” said Mosburger. He wouldn’t say whether there were working smoke alarms in the unit where the fire originated.

But since there was little smoke in the hallways, Mosburger said crews were able to evacuate the building’s other tenants quickly.

“I was in my apartment and I heard an alarm go off,” said Judy Whiteman, who also lives on the second floor of 140 Langarth.

“I looked outside. It was black up the hallway… black smoke so I got out of there.”

Whiteman, who has lived in the two-storey apartment building for five years, recalls another blaze at the building back in 2015.

“I don’t feel safe,” said Whiteman. “Not if there’s going to be fires.”