3 dead, 5 missing after massive Pa. gas blast
Explosion set fire to several houses and sent flames hundreds of feet into the air
February 10, 2011
ALLENTOWN, Pa. — Three dead and five were missing after a massive natural gas explosion demolished and set fire to homes and sent flames hundreds of feet into the air in eastern Pennsylvania.
Allentown fire Chief Robert Scheirer said the victim lived in a two-story row house that exploded Wednesday night. An elderly couple in their 70s lived in the home, but Scheirer says the condition of the body prevented positive identification.
Five other people were still unaccounted for after the blast that leveled two houses. The cause of the explosion is unclear.
The fire that burned for hours has been put out, and 500 to 600 residents who were evacuated are returning to their homes.
Allentown fire Chief Robert Scheirer said early Thursday that the fire consumed an entire row of homes. He predicted eight will be lost and another 16 damaged.
Missing couple The explosion happened at 10:45 p.m. in the home of Beatrice Hall, 74, and husband William, 79, the Allentown Morning Call newspaper reported on its website. The Halls were among the missing, Police Chief Roger MacClean said.
Images from NBC station WCAU showed flames reaching hundreds of the feet into the air from the scene of the blast. The explosion was so powerful it was felt nine miles away in Bethlehem, Pa.
The blaze was put out early Thursday, delayed by the difficulty of digging through packed layers of snow and ice to a ruptured underground gas line that was feeding the flames, Scheirer said.
Residents were allowed to return home early Thursday. They had been taken to a Jewish community center and an agricultural hall at the city's fairgrounds while emergency crews worked overnight.
The blast also downed dozens of high-power electrical lines, according to radio reports monitored by the Morning Calland msnbc.com. PPL Electric Utilities shut down power in the area.
'Under attack'
The blast was so powerful that it sent a flat-screen computer monitor sailing into the back of Antonio Arroyo, whose house was on the opposite end of the row from the house that exploded.
The blast was so powerful that it sent a flat-screen computer monitor sailing into the back of Antonio Arroyo, whose house was on the opposite end of the row from the house that exploded.
"I thought we were under attack," he recalled from a shelter where some 250 people took refuge in the hours after the blast.
Arroyo and his wife, Jill, both 43, lost their home in the fire.
Antonio said he ran outside and saw that an entire house had been leveled, a fireball now raging in the spot where it once stood.
"What I saw, I couldn't believe," said Arroyo, a community volunteer.
He and his wife, a nurse, fled their home with only the clothes on their back. They planned to return at daylight to see what they could salvage. Jill Arroyo broke down sobbing when she recalled her son's athletic memorabilia — likely lost in the blaze — including DVDs of his high school football games.
"The DVDs are gone. All his trophies are gone. All gone," she sobbed as her husband comforted her.
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