Brampton grandmother dies bringing housefire death toll to six
Published April 7, 2022 at 1:47 pm
The grandmother of a Brampton family killed in a housefire last week has died, making her the sixth victim of the deadly blaze.
Bonnie O’Dea was critically injured in a fire that claimed the lives of her daughter Raven Alisha Ali O’Dea, Raven’s husband Nazir Ali and their three children Alia, Jayden and Layla on March 28.
O’Dea reportedly died of her injuries on Wednesday evening.
Emergency crews were called to battle a housefire on Conestoga Drive near Sutter Avenue in Brampton just before 2:00 a.m. on March 28.
Firefighters managed to enter the residence through a front window and six people were removed from the home.
The Ali O’Dea family were pronounced dead a short time later and Bonnie O’Dea was transported to hospital in critical condition. Two other tenants who lived in the basement of the home managed to escape without injuries.
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The children were aged 10, 8 and 7.
Family members said they are devastated by the loss and have started a GoFundMe page to raise funds for funeral arrangements and any memorial costs.
“As a family, we are devastated to lose two generations in a blink of an eye,” a family spokesperson said on the fundraising page. “Our homes are broken as we mourn a loss that we can never replace.”
As of the afternoon April 7 the fundraiser had received over $85,000 in pledges of a $20,000 goal.
The Office of the Fire Marshal (OFM) is investigating the cause and circumstances around the fire, but family members have said smoke alarms in the Ali family home may have been taken down for a recent renovation.
Brampton Fire Chief Bill Boyes and firefighters canvassed the neighbourhood last week after discovering other homes in the community not equipped with working smoke detectors.
“We’re finding no working smoke alarms, smoke alarms with batteries removed in this immediate vicinity where five people just died,” Boyes told reporters following the blaze. “Honestly, it’s completely unacceptable. We have to do better.”
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