Wednesday, December 11, 2019

Remember the Rupert Hotel Fire

There is an event in Toronto this week which remembers the Rupert Hotel fire that took ten lives just before Christmas in 1989.

Here are some details of the event.


Over the years I’ve written some pieces on the fire.  for those who don't know the history of this fire check this link 
https://www.hamiltonjustice.ca/blog?post=Rupert+Hotel+Fire+1989+-+What+has+Changed%3F&id=491

I’m afraid that we have really learned much from this terrible tragedy.  Some thoughts:



Rupert Hotel December 1989*

Gordon was sorry
but it was tough keeping warm
and he’d had some to drink 
so setting fire to those papers on the floor in the middle 
of his second-floor room made some kind of sense.

At the Rupert Hotel, a three-storey brick walk up 
in a licensed city rooming house 
off Queen Street East 
at Parliament
those with few options and few dollars could exist, 
in a way. 

Gordon’s warming fire soon leapt out of control 
flames and choking smoke filling the corridors 
as the fire gained full possession of the hallways.
The license pinned to the wall wasn’t worth the paper 
it was printed on as far as the protection it afforded 
the 31 tenants at the Rupert
on this wintry December night. 
A sprinkler system might have halted the fire’s progress.
Perhaps tenants could have taken action 
if the alarm system had been operable 
or fire extinguishers stored in the basement were reachable.
It was 17 long minutes before someone called 911.
When firefighters arrived 
the whole building was enveloped. 
Flames leapt out of the top floor windows.
Firefighters using ladders forced their way 
into the searing heat of the second floor.  

Later a witness called it 
“A Vision out of Hell.”
As the fire raged people screamed, crying out for friends.
It took six hours and eighteen crews to subdue the blaze.
Thankfully, some tenants were saved and many escaped. 

For days crews chopped through ice and debris to locate bodies. 
They found nine men. 
A woman had returned to the building to help a friend 
Donna Marie Cann died, as had the others, 
of heavy smoke inhalation.

Soon an inquest was held.
Recommendations were made    
new rules created 
regulations established
housing planned.

After a while all was forgotten.
Rules and regulations lapsed, 
were ignored or opposed 
and the programs ended.

In the city today austerity policies 
compel people to rent rooms 
in perilous and dangerous buildings. 
Many flee the downtown to illegal suburban homes 
where life is cheaper.


*According to the Fire Marshal, there were fires at 69 illegal rooming houses in the Toronto area between 2013 and 2017.

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