A few weeks ago, the Associated Press reported that an explosion in a home in Fairborn, Ohio killed a 75-year-old man and caused debris injuries and severe burns to six others, including four children. The blast was so powerful that it also significantly damaged neighboring homes.
Both the gas and water service were turned off inside the home so repair crews could work on the water line. But the house exploded when the crew apparently hit the gas pipe while doing their work. The explosion sent debris and the victims literally flying through the yard, and a neighbor reported seeing a baby with burns, and bloodied from being hit with flying glass.
That 1-year-old baby was in fair condition while a 5-year-old child was in good condition by the next morning, said a spokesman for Dayton Children’s Medical Center. A third child, whose age wasn’t available, was treated and released the same day. But a 13-year-old was transferred in critical condition to Shriner’s Hospital for Children, one of about four hospitals in the country specializing in pediatric burns.
One neighbor told the local newspaper that the blast, which happened 100 yards from her home, felt like a car hitting the side of her house. Windows shattered on homes on both sides of the destroyed house, and debris could be seen a full block away. The neighbor said she saw the infant lying in the yard, and that some of the other victims were laying there too, and still on fire. “It was like a movie scene. You see a huge fireball and you see people come out of it on fire. It was horrible.”
Another neighbor told the newspaper that she was nearly struck by a flying piece of wood that came from the explosion. A few minutes later, she saw two adults running down the sidewalk carrying three bloodied children, so she offered to take the children while the adults returned to the scene. “Medics told me to keep them awake because they had head injuries, so another woman and I sang to them,” Corelli said. “And we didn’t let the kids look back. It was still on fire and there was a lot of blood.”
A spokesperson for Vectren Corp., the company doing the repairs, said it hadn’t yet been confirmed that there was a gas leak, but that the company would conduct its own investigation into the cause of the explosion. The injured people might file a lawsuit against Vectren and other parties, claiming that they committed negligence which resulted in their severe burns and other injuries.
If you or someone you know does suffer a severe burn injury or a smoke inhalation injury, you should call Kramer & Pollack LLP in Mineola, New York so that the personal injury attorneys in that firm can determine whether another party has legal liability for injuries suffered, and if the injured party has a solid legal case.