Approximately 100 firefighters were needed late Sunday and early Monday to tame a five-alarm blaze at a west end house that had been targeted in a drive-by shooting and a Molotov cocktail attack earlier this month.
On Monday Toronto Fire Chief Hugh Ross said arson is suspected.
The flames broke out around 10pm Sunday night at 489 Winona Dr., near Vaughan Road and Oakwood Avenue. Toronto Fire quickly stepped up the response due to the freezing weather.
"When you have the weather like this and the crews start getting wet, they get cold very quickly and obviously the footing is very bad when you start spraying water ... it gets very icy," Toronto Fire Services North Command Division Commander Bob O'Hallarn said.
About an hour into the response there was a partial collapse at the back of the house, forcing crews to take a defensive approach to battling the fire.
The home was gutted and two neighbouring homes were damaged. Neighbours on both sides of the street were evacuated as a precaution. Two police officers were treated for minor smoke inhalation.
A couple with two small kids reportedly live in the home and police got the residents out of the home safely.
Neighbours expressed their concern while fire crews battled to extinguish the flames.
"This has been going on for two weeks now, his house has been attempted to be burned, his house has been shot up, and all of a sudden our lives are getting affected," said one area resident.
"Everybody is trying to figure it out," another added. "No one knows what's going on, why is this happening in our neighbourhood? Why is somebody trying to do this to them, they seem like nice people."
So far, authorities haven’t released any indication of what may have caused the fire.
The address was the target of a drive-by shooting earlier this month and a Molotov cocktail was hurled at the house a few days later, according to published reports.
"We've got information from previous occurrences ... however, we are unable to link any of those ... to the incident that's taken place tonight," Toronto Police Inspector Ruben Strobel said.
"We've contacted the Ontario Fire Marshal's office. So until we get a definite cause of this fire, at this time, I don't want to speculate as to what the cause is."