An explosion destroyed a house in the Pittsburgh area near the Ohio River (Picture: AP)
Two people were discovered dead in a home that was ‘completely leveled’ by a massive explosion.
First responders arrived at the house in a northwest Pittsburgh suburb shortly before 9am on Tuesday and found ‘fire throughout the foundation’ and on the hillside, said Crescent Township Fire Department Chief Andrew Tomer.
The bodies of a man and a woman were pulled from the rubble of the township home near the Ohio River in Pennsylvania.
Their identities and cause and manner of death are being determined by a county medical examiner’s office.
Allegheny County assistant fire chief Andrew Tomer address the media on Tuesday after responding to a fire that leveled a home and killed two (Picture: AP)
The explosion was ‘severe, absolutely extreme’ and ‘you could feel it in your chest’ and throughout Crescent Township and communities across the river, Tomer said.
From the fire department headquarters, Tomer said he and others observed ‘a column of white smoke up in the air followed by a thick column of black smoke’.
Aerial images from the scene showed the home charred black and reduced to wood and pieces. The immediate surrounding area had trees but appeared relatively sparse.
At least two other homes were damaged from the blast, Tomer said.
‘The private gas well was secured by a gas company rep that was in the area and then the propane tanks that are on site were also secured. Other than that, there’s no other utilities up in that area,’ said Tomer, according to KDKA. ‘The power was secured to the initial explosion building.’
A businessman in the area, John Bundy told the Daily Mail that he saw a woman run out of a nearby home carrying a baby and saying that her parents were in the home that exploded.
‘I ran outside and saw the mushroom cloud so I got in my truck and drove over,’ said Bundy.
‘It was an end of the world situation, everything was just shredded or on fire, there was nothing left. The force of the explosion broke windows and there were huge pieces of two-by-four in neighbors’ yards.’
The explosion happened ‘in a remote location, and we’re asking everyone to avoid the area in order to allow responders access’, stated the county emergency services department.
No one else was injured.
The cause of the explosion is being investigated by the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives as well as the Allegheny County fire marshal’s office.
It happened more than a year-and-a-half after 10 people including three children died in a house fire in Nescopeck in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, that a firefighter grandfather of the victims tragically responded to.
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