Tuesday Morning Drama (or...a house explodes in my neighborhood)

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

It was a weird morning.
I was awakened by my phone ringing at about 6 am this morning. I was sure as heck not going to answer the phone. Then I hear my SIL’s voice on the answering machine saying something about a house on fire in the neighborhood. (She lives about 6 houses down from me.) So I figure I probably should call her back.

Yep sure enough the house across the house across the street from her had blown up and caught fire from a gas leak ignited by the pilot light on the hot water heater. The garage door had been completely blown off and was out in the street. mangled. :eek: And flames shooting 15+ feet up into the air. Thankfully the lady who lived there, who is really nice, was not hurt.

The FD & PD had our neighborhood blocked off. And the gas company was checking lines and connections. By the time I left they had started to dig up yards along the gas lines (take that stupid HOA board and your stupid grass!!!) There is only one entrance/exit for our little neighhborhood (78 townhomes) so nobody was going anywhere for a while. (oh darn… I won’t be able to make it to work on time- shucks! it’s a good thing I am salaried :smiley: ) There happened to be a gate fence that can be opened in emergencies on my end of the 'hood (darn)

I called my SIL about an hour ago (1pm here) and she said there were still fire trucks and pocice cars all over and they still had the street blocked . She thought there were still checking for hot spots as they knock down what is left of the house.

Maybe I will post some pics later after I get home from work.

Too much drama for a Tuesday, especially before noon!

2

My house is all electric. ::contented sigh::

3

Here is what is left of the house as of yesterday afternoon.

My sister in law couldn’t really see what was going on very well because it was all blocked off. In some pics what is left does’t look that bad, but all the walls are warped and the whole house was gutted by the fire. I am sure the whole thing will have to be torn down and rebuilt. The entire of the front of the house collapsed. The connected townhome suffered very little damage.

4

When I was a kid, a house down the road from my grandparent’s farm blew up in a gas explosion, killing the dentist who lived there. It went with enough force that 2X4s and shingles were found a half mile away, and the only thing left was the foundation. The house across the road had every window facing the explosion blown out, and scorch marks from flaming debris.

Your SiL and the homeowner were both quite lucky. Give them hugs by proxy for me.