At least one person hospitalized following violent explosion that rocked the Allandale area just before noon Saturday<\/p>\n
Barrie\u2019s Allandale neighbourhood was rocked by an explosion late Saturday morning that sent at least one person to hospital with what officials are calling \u201cserious injuries.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Barrie Fire and Emergency Service\u00a0received the call shortly before noon, Deputy Chief Eric MacFadden told BarrieToday, adding\u00a0information on what caused the incident is still unknown as crews are remain at the scene on Marshall Street, just north of Little Avenue.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a very active incident. Crews are still trying to extinguish some fires. It will be an active scene for a while this way, and then it will be turned over to the Office of the Fire Marshal\u00a0for investigation,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
After receiving the initial call, MacFadden said the fire department immediately upgraded the alarm, and responded with six trucks and two dozen firefighters.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have now called in extra crews, because it\u2019s obviously a very hot day as well, and that adds another factor to it as well, in making sure we are taking care of our people as we are working to extinguish the fire,\u201d he said. \u201cCrews are doing an awesome job.\u201d<\/p>\n
One person has been taken to\u00a0hospital via ambulance with what MacFadden called \u201csignificant injury.\u201d\u00a0However, whether\u00a0that person was in the home at the time of the reported explosion is still unknown.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t know the state of where they were at the time,\u201d MacFadden said.<\/p>\n
Jim and Karen Holmes live on Jane Crescent, which backs onto Marshall Street, and said the explosion shook their house.<\/p>\n
\u201cI thought the big tree behind my house had fallen on my house. It was really scary,\u201d said Jim. \u201cIt was like this big \u2018whoomp\u2019 \u2014\u00a0 like a shockwave. I thought our huge maple tree crashed on our roof.\u201d<\/p>\n
The feeling, added Karen, was \u201cout of this world.\u201d<\/p>\n
When the couple couldn\u2019t find anything on the house, they went outside to see if any of their neighbours had witnessed anything, only to find everyone out on their lawns and smoke billowing from the next block over.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m told it\u2019s a young family and one person was pulled out. I couldn\u2019t believe it when I walked up to have a look. It was gone. Literally, just imploded,\u201d Jim said, adding he heard a second, smaller explosion following the first one.<\/p>\n
The couple is worried\u00a0but hopeful\u00a0no one was killed, adding they had heard\u00a0the young family had only recently moved into the home.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are devastated for the family,\u201d said Karen.<\/p>\n
As of 1 p.m., the two homes on either side of the destroyed home had been evacuated, said MacFadden, and the immediate area has been cordoned off, but many people remain in the area watching as crews work to extinguish the fire, he noted.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are still working to isolate some of the utilities, just to ensure we make it safe for everybody else,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
The following video was taken by Jim Holmes.<\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"At least one person hospitalized following violent explosion that rocked the Allandale area just before noon Saturday Barrie\u2019s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":57756,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[38210,38209,43,44,41,39,42,40],"class_list":["post-57755","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-202563-marshall-street-explosion63-marshall-streetbarrie-home-explosionbarrie-house-explosion63-marshall-st","tag-barriebarrie-fire-and-emergency-servicesbfesallandale-home-explosionmarshall-street-explosionmarshall-street-explosion-august-9","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57755","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=57755"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57755\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/57756"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=57755"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=57755"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=57755"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}