*https://www.nytimes.com/
<https://www.nytimes.com/>2018/09/13/us/lawrence-massachusetts-explosion-gas-fire.html?action=click&module=Top%20Stories&pgtype=Homepage*
Gas Explosions Erupt at Dozens of Homes in Andover and Lawrence, Mass.
Image
Flames consuming the roof of a home in Lawrence, Mass., a suburb of Boston.
One person was killed and more than 20 were injured after explosions at
dozens of homes in Lawrence, Andover and North Andover.CreditCreditWCVB,
via Associated Press
By Katharine Q. Seelye <http://www.nytimes.com/by/katharine-q-seelye>, Farah
Stockman <https://www.nytimes.com/by/farah-stockman>, Jacey Fortin
<https://www.nytimes.com/by/jacey-fortin> and Monica Davey
<http://www.nytimes.com/by/monica-davey>
- Sept. 13, 2018
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LAWRENCE, Mass. — Violent explosions and billowing fires tore through three
towns north of Boston late Thursday afternoon, damaging dozens of houses,
forcing thousands of stunned residents to evacuate and plunging much of the
region into an eerie darkness.
One person was killed and more than 20 were injured in the sudden string of
explosions caused by gas leaks in Lawrence, Andover and North Andover as
blackish-gray clouds of smoke rolled across rooftops and flames shot into
the sky.
Leonel Rondon, 18, was killed while he sat in a car in the driveway of a
home in Lawrence, the authorities said. A chimney fell onto the car, they
said, when the home, on Chickering Road, exploded.
Across the region, residents returned from work to find their homes burning
and neighbors standing outside with no clear sense of what to do.
Firefighters and other emergency workers raced from block to block, urging
residents to evacuate to shelters that were hastily being opened. Along
some blocks, the smell of gas hung in the air, and cellphones buzzed with
evacuation warnings.
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“It looked like Armageddon, it really did,” Michael Mansfield, the fire
chief of Andover, who has worked as a firefighter for almost four decades,
told a CBS station in Boston. “There were billows of smoke coming from
Lawrence behind me. I could see plumes of smoke in front of me from the
town of Andover. It looked like an absolute war zone.”
The string of explosions, fires and reports of gas odor — at least 70 of
them, although officials were still trying to account for all of the damage
late Thursday — came suddenly, beginning shortly before 5 p.m., without
warning and without an immediate explanation from officials. But natural
gas, and the possibility that gas had become overpressurized in a main, was
the focus of many local authorities.
Earlier in the day, a local gas company, Columbia Gas of Massachusetts, had
announced
<https://www.columbiagasma.com/en/about-us/newsroom/news/2018/09/13/improvin…>
that
it was “upgrading natural gas lines in neighborhoods across the state.”
Late Thursday, the company issued a statement
<https://www.columbiagasma.com/en/about-us/newsroom/news/2018/09/14/incident…>:
“Columbia Gas crews are currently responding to reports of multiple fires
in Lawrence. Our thoughts are with everyone affected by today’s incident.”
Image
Dan Rivera, the mayor of Lawrence, said it may take days to ensure that
homes are safe to enter.CreditCJ Gunther/Epa-Efe, via Rex
With three communities that are home to more than 100,000 people involved,
the aftermath was chaotic, confusing and shifting by the minute. In some
neighborhoods, firefighters found themselves putting out one fire, only to
find another breaking out next door or down the block. Images from Lawrence
showed several housing complexes bursting with flames and thick smoke
billowing as firefighters rushed to the scenes.
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Annie Wilson, 73, was home alone in her third-floor apartment in south
Lawrence when she smelled smoke. She opened her back door and smoke poured
into the house. She ran out the front, and her parakeets flew away as she
tried to rescue them.
Fire quickly consumed the building. Ms. Wilson said she lost everything,
including her husband’s ashes, which were in an urn, all her family
photographs and all her clothes.
“It was just crazy,” said Jessica Wilson, 43, Ms. Wilson’s daughter-in-law.
“People were walking in the street with bags, kids were crying, there were
sirens all over the place.”
In the long hours after the fires, sections of the communities turned dark
and silent, with power turned off and people told to leave. More than
18,000 customers were without electricity at one point on Thursday night.
Long lines of traffic jammed the roads out of some towns. Traffic was
crammed, too, near roads to shelters that were opened to those left
homeless. Some exits off the major interstate highways were closed, and
officials said the area’s schools would be shuttered on Friday.
Thousands of people were left to sort out what to do. Some people said they
were told to leave only if they smelled gas; others said they were told to
leave regardless. Residents said they were uncertain whether to stay or go,
and when they might return. “What we need folks to do is that if it’s
happening in your home, you have a funny smell, just evacuate, come out to
the street,” Mayor Dan Rivera of Lawrence told WBZ-TV
<https://boston.cbslocal.com/2018/09/13/lawrence-fires-explosions-gas-main/>
.
The worst part, said Maria Santana, who was at home in Lawrence when she
smelled gas, was that the explosions came without warning and that no one
in authority seemed to have any idea of what was happening. A school not
far from her home that her children and grandchildren had attended was
damaged, she said.
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“We didn’t know anything then and we still don’t know anything,” she said.
“We don’t even know how we’re standing up right now.”
Image
Natural gas, and the possibility that gas had become overpressurized in a
main, was the focus of many local authorities on Thursday evening.CreditCarl
Russo/The Eagle-Tribune, via Associated Press
Maureen Taylor, 55, had been putting a roast in the oven at her Andover
home when something seemed strange: The gas stove made the usual clicking
noises, but it would not light.
“I wasn’t getting any gas,” she said. “It was very bizarre.”
A minute or so later, her phone buzzed with an alarm telling her to
evacuate.
“I’m very lucky that the stove didn’t go off,” she said.
On her way to a senior center for shelter, Ms. Taylor saw two homes in her
neighborhood burning. Officers were gathered on the streets. At the senior
center, Ms. Taylor said she was surrounded by dozens of other people who
wondered what would come next.
“They’re worried about getting home,” she said. “They’re worried about
their animals. Because really we were just given a few minutes to evacuate,
and we keep hearing new information about whether we’re going to go back
tonight or not.”
As the night wore on, leaders of the three towns suggested that residents
who had been evacuated needed to stay away — at least for now. No timeline
for cleanup and safety checks was set, they said, and no one had a real
sense of how much damage had been done.
Mr. Rivera said the affected properties in Lawrence were south of the
Merrimack River. He warned people not to return to their homes on Thursday
evening, and that it may take days to ensure that homes are safe to enter.
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“If you are out of the house, stay away from your properties until we have
made it safe for everyone,” Mr. Rivera said. “If you have not evacuated,
you have just got to go. Trust us when we tell you that if you stay in your
home, you will be at risk.”
Gov. Charlie Baker said public safety officers and government officials are
focused on trying to make sure that people are safe and that communities
make it through the night safely, despite the loss of power and lingering
fears over gas. Later, he said, he will turn his attention to what caused
the explosion.
“We’ll get to the question about what happened,” he said.
Katharine Q. Seelye reported from Lawrence, Mass.; Farah Stockman from
Cambridge, Mass.; Jacey Fortin from New York; and Monica Davey from
Chicago. Andrew R. Chow and Julia Jacobs contributed reporting from New
York.