A man has been arrested after an explosive fire in a Brampton apartment building that nearly injured a 12-year-old boy.
Police allege the man was manufacturing crystal meth.
Peel Police were called to the high-rise at 2 Silver Maple Ct., near Dixie Road and Queen Street East, at around 5:30 p.m. on Saturday.
A fire had broken out in a bathroom on the 16th floor, forcing the evacuation of the building.
Kareem Hamid, 12, was heading to a friend’s apartment to play video games when he says the wall “burst out.”
“All the cement and everything just came on the ground and I was close to being hit by it,” he says. “I didn't know what was happening.”
Hamid thought it might have been a bomb. He ran down the stairs, and escaped uninjured.
Gurjeet Kajla, 31, was taken to hospital with a second-degree burn to his right arm.
He has been charged with mischief endangering life and production of a controlled substance.
Residents living on every floor except the 16th were allowed to return to their homes Saturday night.
Police say residents of the 16th floor may have to wait until late Sunday or early Monday before they are allowed back in.
Const. Lilly Fitzpatrick of Peel Regional Police says making illegal drugs is very dangerous.
“The chemicals that are used to manufacture methamphetamine can be extremely volatile,” she says. “You are putting every single person in that building under risk.”
This is the second time in just over a month that a suspected meth lab has exploded inside a GTA apartment.
An explosion in a condo building in the Liberty Village area blew the door off an elevator shaft, destroyed much of a unit’s interior and injured one man.
With a report from CTV Toronto’s Scott Lightfoot
