‘The flames were huge’: One person in critical condition after Transcona home burns

Four people are in hospital — three of them children and a fourth believed to be an adult in critical condition — after firefighters rescued one person from a burning house in Transcona on Saturday.

Winnipeg Fire Paramedic Service discovered heavy smoke and flames coming from the one-and-a-half storey house at 214 Yale Avenue West when they responded to the blaze at 7:28 a.m.

Firefighters rescued one person inside the house while the others were able to escape the fire on their own.

The fire was brought under control about 45 minutes after crews arrived.

Area resident Melissa Klassen said she went outside after waking to the sound of numerous sirens from arriving fire trucks.

“It was scary,” Klassen said on Saturday while nearby workers put boards over the windows of the heavily damaged house located across the street from Transcona Memorial United Church.

“The flames were huge. The house was quickly ablaze. I was just yelling to the firefighters “there are kids in the house.”

Klassen said she believes the four, who are all boys, are ages 18, 14, eight and four.

She said about half an hour after firefighters arrived they brought a victim, she believes to be the oldest, because he looked to be about the size of an adult, out of the house.

“Eight firefighters carried him out,” she said.

“He looked worse than critical. It didn’t look great to me. It was pretty sad to see.”

Area residents said the long-time owner of the house died in September and her niece and that woman’s four children moved in shortly after and have lived there only a few weeks.

They said the mother returned during the fire and quickly left in an ambulance with one of her children.

Klassen said another area resident tried to help rescue the victim while firefighters were arriving.

“He was on the roof of the house trying to get through it — he had a pick axe,” she said.

“The flames were shooting up around him.”

Klassen said that resident didn’t appear to have been injured during the attempt and she later saw him walking around the neighbourhood.

The fire is under investigation and no damage estimate is available.

Meanwhile, there were no injuries reported following a house fire in the 600 block of Boyd Avenue on Friday.

Smoke was coming out of the house when firefighters began attacking the fire at 8:11 p.m. It was declared under control at 8:46 p.m.

Firefighters said all of the occupants of the house escaped the blaze before they arrived.

The fire is under investigation and the amount of damage isn’t known.

kevin.rollason@freepress.mb.ca