Fire crews bring dog to safety as flames breach townhouse attic

Firefighters rescued a dog from a townhome after fast-moving flames travelled up the back of a house on Wednesday morning.

Crews got calls at 8:44 a.m. reporting black smoke coming from the backyard of a two-storey semi-detached townhome in the 300 block of Glenbrae Avenue. One of the callers was a neighbour who told dispatchers there were no cars in the driveway and a dog was inside the home.

Four minutes after the calls, fire crews confirmed smoke and flames from the townhome off March Road in the city’s northwest end.

Officials used an advanced hose line to the back of the home while a secondary crew searched the building. At this point, flames had travelled up the entire backside of the home to the evestrough and attic, a post on X reads.

Pulling down parts of the ceiling to extinguish the flames inside the attic, another official found the dog and brought it outside.

Crews also took down pieces of the evestrough to douse the flames.

Just under 45 minutes after crews were dispatched the fire was under control before it spread to neighbouring homes.

“Firefighters performed salvage operations putting tarps on the belongings inside to protect them from smoke and water damage,” officials note in the post.