The St. James explosion of ’92

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 26/02/2018 (2773 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A quarter of a century ago, the northwest corner of Whytewold Road and Portage Avenue resembled a war zone. A multi-use western St. James complex had been destroyed by a terrible gas explosion.

In the late 1950s, western St. James was growing with the construction of single dwelling homes and Portage Avenue apartment blocks. The northwest corner of Portage and Whytewold was developed at the time. The Sandra apartment block was home to six suites. For more than three decades, other parts of the building were used by various businesses, including Whytewold Drugs, Whytewold Department Store, Young’s Hardware, the Bank of Montreal, IGA, and Blossom Florists.

Other business tenants included dentists, physicians, lawyers, hair stylists, and a post office.

At 10:30 a.m. on Friday, Dec. 4, 1992, someone noticed a strong gas smell related to back lane excavation work. Buildings were evacuated, as was the surrounding neighbourhood as far north as Lodge Avenue. A total of 183 homes and 83 apartments were vacated. Many residents were forced to leave their pets. 

At 1 p.m. there was a fiery explosion that was felt for miles in every direction. Windows of the apartment blocks at 2440 and 2461 Portage Avenue and 2461 Portage were broken.

All eight lanes of Portage Avenue were closed for about 10 hours. During the  evening rush hour, Mount Royal Road temporarily became a northbound one-way street and travel time between Portage and Ness Avenue was upwards of 30 minutes. Portage Avenue reopened at 8:30 p.m. and evacuated residents were let back into their homes in the early evening. The residents of the Sandra block never got to return to their homes.

The damaged  building was demolished.

It was a miracle that no one was killed.

Fred Morris is a community correspondent for St. James. Reach him at fredmorris@hotmail.com