Crews rescue one man from smoke-filled, high-rise apartment building

Ottawa firefighters rescued one man trapped in his bedroom after flames spread through his apartment early Friday morning.

According to a press release, crews were initially called from the building’s monitoring agency at around 3:53 a.m. Firefighters arrived in four minutes at a high-rise apartment building in the 1400 block of Mayview Avenue in Ottawa’s Carlington neighbourhood.

Once there, the fire panel indicated that a smoke detector was going off on the second floor of the multi-unit building. Dozens of people were forced to evacuate their homes to waiting OC Transpo buses.

When firefighters got to the second floor, they were met with smoke in the hallway. They had to breach the door to enter the unit and found flames in the living room that were starting to spread to the balcony.

One team doused the small blaze, and another searched through the unit, finding a man in his 30s in the bedroom.

Teams brought the man downstairs, where he was assessed and treated for smoke inhalation. He was not sent to hospital, firefighters said.

The fire was under control by 4:37 a.m. By then, crews had started an extensive ventilation operation before allowing people back into their homes.