WASHINGTON, D.C. -- A man was critically injured Wednesday when his Southeast home exploded shortly after he returned from work, fire officials said.
D.C. Fire and EMS spokesman Alan Etter said the 49-year-old victim was taken to Washington Hospital Center's MedStar Unit with second- and third-degree burns over half of his body.
Neighbor Roy Tolbert was working in his garage across the street when he felt a blast that shook the whole neighborhood. He described it as something out of the Shock and Awe campaign that began the Iraq (web | news) war.
"I heard the explosion. It was like the start of Iraq, when you seen the bombs -- Boom! -- and the ground shook. And I was like, that's no car accident," Tolbert recalled. "And then I heard somebody screaming."
His badly burned neighbor was calling for help, so Tolbert jumped his gate and ran across the street.
"He was standing on the side, screaming. I asked him if anyone was inside the house. He was like, the dog, but I still saw [the home] was burning so I grabbed the neighbor's hose and called 911."
The blast tore holes in the back of the home in the 1100 block of 46th Street SE and nearly crumbled its foundations. There was concern the explosion, which originated in the roof, was touched off by a natural gas leak, but firefighters quickly ruled that out, saying the source was likely propane gas.
"Usually if it's natural gas or lighter than air, the roof blows off," said D.C. Fire Chief Dennis Rubin.
Fire investigators will enter the house Thursday to determine what happened.
The man remains hospitalized in critical condition.
Republished with permission of WJLA-TV
