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House explosion

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frenchblueC2

amusé par les flatulences
Joined
May 14, 2001
Messages
14,442
Location
Youngstown, OH
In case any of you have heard the news this morning, the Barrett street house explosion is practically across the street from us.
http://www.wmur.com/news/18781604/detail.html
Barrett is the road parallel to Blevens, which is the road we live on. We can see everything from our house.

The explosion woke us up - we heard and felt it shake our house.
We immediately got up to see where it came frome. Mike spotted the smoke and then the blaze erupted.
The whole house was engulfed immediately.
Mike called 911, and we're pretty sure we were the first to call. I called a neighbor that I could see did not wake up from the sound to alert them in case the fire spread - because it really did look like it would spread far. The flames were HUGE!
The video in that link was filmed later, so it doesn't even show how truly huge the flames were.

We dressed and ran out of the house to see if we could help, but there's no way we could have helped anyone out of that house. The fire was too much at once.
This was the most upsetting to me. Watching that massive blaze and knowing people were most definitely dead.
I had a hard time maintaining composure.
That's when neighbors told us who lived there. We were all there before fire officials, but their response time was still incredible!

Activity has been constant around here. Every news helicopter you can think of has been flying overhead all morning since 5ish.
Roads are still closed, but we do at least have our hill - Mayflower to get out of the neighborhood.
 
We have had a couple of explosions as well in the news are here (in Duluth). Crazy stuff....did you go to work or call in?
 
No way I could go to work today. I'm still too shaken up.
I am trying to tell myself that he died instantly. I don't want to know that he suffered at all.

One news station reported that it was his birthday the other day. :(
 
frenchblueC2 said:
No way I could go to work today. I'm still too shaken up.
I am trying to tell myself that he died instantly. I don't want to know that he suffered at all.

One news station reported that it was his birthday the other day. :(
Click to expand...

Well, someone at his age most likely would have been killed right away or least knocked out and died from smoke. Wonder if he left the oven on or a pilot light went out and the gas built up until the fridge kicked in and sparked it. That is one reason why I hate having natural gas for our furnace. With fuel oil, it just gets cold.
 
That's terrible! I'm sorry you had to go through that.

Something similar happened this past Saturday in Norton, Ma (couple towns over).
http://wbztv.com/local/norton.house.fire.2.940421.html
It was actually my manager's next door neighbor and he saw it all happen and tried to help. Half way through the day, he got a call from his wife telling him that they were pulling the boy's body out :nonono:
 
Piped natural gas petrifies me. In my last two apartments, there was a pilot light out when I moved in: my last place, the stovetop (no safety pilot); in my current place, my hot water heater.

That quiet neighborhood has seen a lot of activity in the past 12 months. I too hope he went quickly. I hope you're doing ok.
 
Glad you're ok...I've seen two cases near here that the explosions took out neighboring houses too, luckily mid-day & noone was home. Hang in there you guys.
 
Kim, I shot an email to your work addy... I really hope you and Mike are OK. I totally understand how you could be so shaken up.

:(

**HUGS**
 
Damn! A house exploded down here but it just blew the roof off and scared people. They think it was a slow gas leak underground where the wet soil absorbed the gas and then put it in the house when it dried out. Sorry you had to see it.
 
My best to you and Mike. I'm sure it was painful to experience that. My house has gas and I am thankful the furnace has an electronic pilot (not sure how that works). Not so sure about the water heater.
 
I can't believe the number of house and manhole cover explosions this year!! Guess thats what happens with extreme weather changes and a haggard infrastructure. Glad to hear you weren't hurt! As sson as I saw this on the news I worried it was close to you.
 
We didn't know him at all. Even the neighbor that lived across from him for 30 years barely knew him. He was quiet and kept to himself, for the most part.

They're still not exactly sure of the cause. News reports said the gas company will be digging down to the pipes that lead into his property today, and fire personnel are still trying to pick through the pieces and get down to where the basement was.
 
It's one thing to see it when it's a planned burn or something. I've seen firemen do practice routines on abandoned houses before, and I was standing pretty close too.
This was absolutely nothing like that. There was no cool factor about it.
It scared the ever living :censored::censored::censored::censored: out of me.

Although, I will admit marvelling at one of the fire hoses they used. That did have a bit of a "cool" factor to it.
It brought to mind the movie UHF. :eek:

Later on, we were watching one of the engines put their hose away. Mike joked to me that he was going to ask if he could have a drink from the hose.
Sometimes you just gotta laugh the uneasy feelings away.
 
Yeah, don't drink from the hose....I've sucked up frogs and fish thru some of our older pond hook ups back in the day...it's no longer whole when it comes out....but the gunk that accumulates in the pump, tank and hydrants is bad enough.
 
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