A destructive fire that tore through a home on Sunday in Oro-Medonte and completely gutted the residence is being treated as suspicious.
A pile of charred rubble is all that remains after crews battled the flames for nearly six hours on Line 12 North, south of Highway 12 shortly after 5 p.m.
“Oh, it’s gone. I’m a retired firefighter, I know when a house is gone, and it’s gone,” said the homeowner, Mike Draper.
Draper’s 66-year-old wife Elise is in hospital recovering from burns to her lower body. A volunteer firefighter with Severn Township happened to be driving by and jumped into action. He, along with a family friend, pulled her from the burning home.
Firefighter Mark Jones says the woman was unconscious in a screened-in porch in the back of the house when he found her.
Just moments later, the farmhouse became an inferno.
“It was our home for 16 years,” said Draper. “It was everything. All our treasures, all our photos, and videos, they’re gone.”
The property has been turned over to the OPP and the Ontario Fire Marshal’s office to investigate. They are treating it as suspicious.
