Firefighters pulled two people to safety after they became trapped on the Scarborough Bluffs on Monday night.
Toronto Fire District Chief Stephan Powell says that crews were first dispatched to Cathedral Bluffs Park at around 8:45 p.m. after receiving reports about two people who went 10 to 15 feet down the side of the cliff and then couldn’t get back to the top.
Powell says that the trapped individuals used a flashlight to alert firefighters to their location. At that point, he said that firefighters descended the cliff to verify that they were both OK before using ropes to pull them to safety.
The area where the rescue took place was near a portion of Cathedral Bluffs Park close to the cliff that is off limits to members of the public; however residents in the area tell CP24 that they regularly see people ignoring signs advising them to stay back.
Speaking with reporters at an unrelated press conference on Tuesday morning, Mayor John Tory conceded that it has become far too prevalent of a practice but he said that doesn’t know what else the city can do to discourage trespassing.
“We have certainly done our best to put up signs and there are fences, so people have to go out of their way to do this knowing that it happens weekend after weekend that people have to be rescued,” he said. “I think the only next step you could take would be to say you are going to send people a bill for emergency services but that is a precedent that could apply to a number of other areas and I just don’t know if that is the right way to go about this.”
Tory described venturing over the edge of the Bluffs as a “stupid thing to do.”
He said that it’s dangerous and costly to the city because of the number of people that have to be rescued.
“I don’t know why they just don’t stop doing it,” he said.
In a message posted to Twitter on Tuesday morning, Fire Chief Matthew Pegg said that while the Bluffs offer amazing views of the city they should only be taken in “from a safe distance.”
