‘Very significant blast’: Three injured after two separate Hamilton building explosions

Ontario’s Office of the Fire Marshal is investigating two separate explosions at homes in Hamilton that injured three people Thursday morning.

Despite the pair of explosions occurring within 90 minutes of each other and 17 km apart, Fire Chief David Cunliffe says they are not connected.

“They’re non-related. This is not a norm in Hamilton. We don’t get a lot of buildings that explode and quite frankly, to have two in the same day within hours is really not something that we see a lot of,” Cunliffe says during a news conference.

One of the explosions took place around 9 a.m. at a single-storey home located at 8 Lampton Place, near Parkdale Avenue North.

The Hamilton Fire Department says two seniors were still inside the home when the fire broke out.

A house on Lampton Place in Hamilton partially collapsed following an explosion on Oct. 8, 2026. (Duane Worth/CHCH News)

“Two occupants had been rescued by neighbours and were outside of the building on our arrival, both needing medical attention,” Cunliffe says.

“One individual was sent to hospital by Hamilton paramedics in serious condition with burns. The other was in stable condition with some burns.”

It took nearly 50 firefighters approximately 30 minutes to get the blaze under control.

Investigators say the estimated cost of damages is $750,000 as a part of the house has collapsed and it has been significantly consumed by fire.

Cunliffe says neighbours reported smelling natural gas before the explosion took place. Enbridge crews are currently digging at the scene to see whether there is a gas leak in the piping system.

‘A very significant blast’

Just 90 minutes earlier, Hamilton Fire responded around 7:30 a.m. to a multiple-alarm blaze that caused an explosion at 182 Springside Dr., near Upper James Street and Rymal Road East.

Crews heading to the scene from the Upper Wentworth Station reported seeing a “large smoke plume” by Rymal Road.

Cunliffe says a man was inside of a large garage on the property at the time of the fire and explosion. He was rushed to Hamilton General Hospital in serious condition with significant burns.

Two homes adjacent to the garage have been significantly damaged, while other homes in the area have had some windows break from the blast.

The Office of the Fire Marshal is working with Hamilton police to determine the cause. There’s no word yet on whether this explosion is considered suspicious.

Cunliffe says damage estimates are expected to be significant.

The view of a blaze on Springside Drive in Hamilton shows the backyard of a home directly behind the fire on Oct. 8, 2026. (Photo Courtesy of Pat Bevan)

“The blast was felt at our station on Upper Wellington Street and also at our other station over at Nebo and Stone Church. The police station 30 also felt it,” he says.

“We know that people were calling from all over. It was a very significant blast…The debris field was very significant.”

Residents in the area tell CHCH News that they heard the large explosion and could feel it from two streets over. They described it as shaking their house.

“We had reports of a plane crash. There were all kinds of things that people thought of in terms of the general proximity of where we are here,” Cunliffe says at the scene, which is less than 10 minutes from John C. Munro Hamilton International Airport.

“When you get a noise of that nature, people just don’t know what it is. They’ll start thinking about what it could be.”

This is a developing story. More to come.

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