Nov. 19--FLORISSANT -- Officials were mum about what caused a house explosion here Sunday morning that killed a man.
But a neighbor, Anthony King, said he was told that police found a suicide note in a car parked nearby. Kirk Sayles, the lone resident of the home at 22 Floweridge Lane, was the victim, authorities confirmed. Police said an investigation was underway.
The split-level house ended up in pieces across the yard, with its walls flattened. A small block of wood with the house number "22" rested at the edge of the scene.
"It blew it off the foundation," said Deputy Fire Chief Scott Seppelt of the Florissant Valley Fire Protection District.
Firefighters, alerted about 2:50 a.m., arrived to find the building in flames and natural gas spewing from a break in the line at the meter. They had to let the flames burn off escaping gas for hours, until Laclede Gas workers with a backhoe could dig up the line at a safe distance and shut off the flow.
But natural gas is not what exploded, Seppelt said, because service beyond the meter had been cut off some time ago. "I don't know if he wasn't paying his bills or what," he said. "But it was locked off for months."
The body was removed about 11:30 a.m.
King, 42, said he fled his house in such a rush after the explosion that his pants were inside out and he left his shoes behind. With him went his three children, ages 10-21, and daughter-in-law, 22. None was hurt. The fire was so intense, it melted siding on their home.
"It was scary, man, because I had to get my kids out," he said.
It appeared that the blast knocked out a window on a silver Kia Soul that was parked on the street near the house. King said that's where authorities found a suicide note addressed to the dead man's brother.
King said the man he thinks was killed was a "good guy" who had lived in the house about 20 years and worked at a nursing home. "He was going through something," King said. "I don't know what. ..."
A relative said the family had no comment at this time.
Copyright 2012 - St. Louis Post-Dispatch
