Fiery Tesla crash near Toronto waterfront leaves 4 dead, 1 injured: 'Speed was a factor'
The injured woman was rescued by a passing motorist who stopped to help her
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Three men and a woman, all in their ’20s and ’30s, were killed and a woman was sent to hospital with serious but non-life-threatening injuries after a Tesla was involved in a single-vehicle crash in downtown Toronto.
It’s believed the car was speeding eastbound on Lake Shore Blvd. E. before it hit a guard rail and then a concrete pillar and burst into flames near Cherry St. shortly after midnight Thursday.
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Fiery Tesla crash near Toronto waterfront leaves 4 dead, 1 injured: 'Speed was a factor' Back to video
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“We have gathered some evidence so far to suggest that speed was a factor,” Toronto Police Duty Insp. Phillip Sinclair told reporters.
Sinclair said the injured woman was rescued by a passing motorist, believed to be male, who stopped to help her.
“(The motorist) provided assistance and was able to extricate one of the females,” said Sinclair.
“They certainly stepped up and I believe the fire had started when the bystander provided assistance. So thanks very much to that bystander. We have been speaking to them and obviously they were also deeply affected by this incident. It’s a very horrific scene.”
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Toronto Deputy Fire Chief Jim Jessop described the aftermath of the crash as a “significant fire.”
“Once the fire was extinguished our crews noted a number of persons inside the vehicle,” said Jessop.
“Toronto firefighters carefully extricated the bodies and they’re now in the care of the office of the Chief Coroner. Toronto Fire Service Investigations division will be assisting the Toronto Police with the investigation into the role the origin causes, the circumstances, the role the fire played in this collision.”
Jessop said the fact that it was an electric-powered car would have been a factor in the size of the blaze.
“Certainly the intensity of the fire is directly linked to the battery cells in the Tesla,” he said.
“But I want to be very clear, we’ve all attended collisions where we’ve had horrible car fires as well that are gasoline powered. I will say we had to take extra car this morning in reopening the Lakeshore this morning with the assistance of Toronto Police in removing and transporting one of the battery packs that was ejected during the collision.”
Jessop says a dumpster was brought in for the battery pack to be placed in and covered with sand and was taken away to a yard to be safely disposed of because of “thermal runaway and the fact that these can reignite up until weeks and weeks later.”
Lake Shore Boulevard was closed in both directions from the Don Valley Parkway to Cherry St. ahead of the morning rush hour and has since had one lane opened in both directions.
Police said the investigation is ongoing.
“We are asking anyone who may have been in the area by Lakeshore Blvd. E. and Cherry St. who may have witnessed the incident or has dashcam footage to come and talk to police,” said Sinclair.
City of Toronto road crews were called in to clean up the area where the Tesla crashed.
The guard rail along the Keating Channel was visibly warped and a large black mark could be seen on a pillar that supports the Gardiner Expressway just before the DVP and Don Roadway.
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Construction workers on the north side of the Lake Shore Blvd. E., working the early morning shift said they saw the aftermath.
One worker said the car looked “crumpled” and “all the doors were ripped off it” – likely from responding firefighters.
A foreman at the site, who has been working there since COVID on Gardiner platform reconstruction projects, said the stretch of road is like a “racetrack.”
The man went to to point out the asphalt along the stretch of the Lake Shore from Cherry Beach to the Don Roadway is heavily grooved and bumpy along the stretch.
“I’ve seen cars literally flying through the area after they hit bumps,” he said.
Over the years, the stretch of roadway has seen some horrible crashes and fatalities.
On Jan. 20 of this year, an 18-year-old man driving a 2014 Jeep Cherokee was killed in a head-on collision.
The vehicle the young man was in crashed through the guard rail and ended up submerged under the ice in the Keating Channel. The vehicle was pulled from the iced over channel and his body was discovered a short time later.
On March 29, 2013, a 16-year-old boy was one of five teens inside a 2009 Acura that crashed through the guard rail in the same area – known then as the Don Basin waterway.
Four other teens in the SUV escaped the vehicle crash into the water, but the 16-year-old – identified by Toronto Police as AJ Blugerman – died later in hospital after being submerged in the vehicle for over 30 minutes.
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