1 dead, 15 injured after gas explosion in Murrieta destroys home

A natural gas explosion Monday killed a gas company employee and destroyed a home in Murrieta in a powerful blast that rocked the area.

Debris from the explosion was strewn across Spinning Wheel Drive and Wooden Horse Trail, in front of the lot where the home once sat. A garage door panel lay crumpled on the street as shattered windows were visible at homes along the street.

“On behalf of Murrieta Fire & Rescue and the city of Murrieta, we’d like to offer our deepest sympathies and condolences to the victim,” Murrieta Fire & Rescue spokeswoman Dawn Morrison said during Monday evening’s news conference.

One SoCalGas company employee was killed in the explosion, spokeswoman Christine Detz said in a statement. A second SoCalGas employee was injured, along with 14 others in the explosion that rocked the Murrieta neighborhood.

David Lantzer, deputy fire chief with Murrieta Fire & Rescue Department, said three of the 15 injured were firefighters and all had been transported to hospitals for evaluation. No further details about conditions was made available.

Everyone had been accounted for, according to Lantzer at an evening news conference.

The explosion, shut down Clinton Keith Road, from Nutmeg Street to Carrington Street for hours.

Even residents were being kept from the area as police and fire personnel continued to assess damage in the area into the night.

At the 6:30 p.m. news conference, officials said it was unclear when residents would be allowed to return.

A care and reception center was set up at Vista Murrieta High School, 28251 Clinton Keith Road, and public safety officials were directing residents who have been displaced to go there.

Residents voiced concerns at the evening news conference — one man asked when he’d be able to check-in on his animals.

Morrison said animal control services were in the area, and Lantzer said those who went to the care and reception center would be notified when it was OK to return home.

“Right now we’re working on a repopulation plan — we know that you want to go home,” Morrison said.

Lantzer said the damaged natural gas line was reported shortly before 11 a.m. and that SoCalGas workers arrived at the scene about 20 minutes later, with the explosion reported at 12:10 p.m. By 1 p.m. gas had been shut off, Detz said.

No one called 811 to get gas lines marked, said Cedric Williams, vice president of Construction at SoCalGas, during the evening news conference. He said it may have led to the explosion.

The 811 line is set up, so that residents can contact utility services in the area before work is done so that the utilities can mark where on the property water, power and gas lines exist.

Witnesses to the midday explosion said it was violent and shook nearby homes like a major earthquake rumbled through the area.

Flames shot up 15 feet higher than the home’s roof, freelance photographer Andrew Foulk said. He said the home’s roof was blown off and “the house is pretty much rubble. The roof has collapsed and most of the walls have collapsed.”

The explosion caused significant damage throughout the neighborhood.

Lastacia Neat, 47, who lives with her family across the street and two houses down from the home that blew up, said there were shattered windows throughout the neighborhood, which authorities had cordoned off.

Another resident, Kevin McKinney, 63, lives in a home next door to where the explosion occurred. He said it not only destroyed that home but caused significant damage to his. McKinney said he heard “Just a huge, huge explosion and then I heard screams and went outside.”

He said he found a man lying on the street near his trailer. The man was taken away in an ambulance, he said. McKinney said the explosion blew out windows on one side of his home, and a piece of the roof from the exploded home ended up inside his.

 

The blast also damaged the front end of a fire truck, the cab was visibly marred and the windshield was shattered.

Neat said she got a call at work from her 22-year-old daughter, who was at home at the time.

At first the daughter thought an earthquake had hit, but then ran outside to see the burning home. Neat said the daughter was using the Facetime feature on her iPhone, and flipped the camera toward the home.

Neat said she saw the burning home, but not the injured people. Her daughter did.

“She started screaming, ‘we need towels, we need towels,’ ” Neat said in a telephone interview. She said she told her daughter to get towels, but not get too close to the home.

“By the time I got home, the house was completely gone,” she said.

Ray Ortega, 59, who lives about a quarter mile away on another street said he also felt a strong jolt.

“I said, ‘that’s not an earthquake’ and my wife said, ‘I think there’s something happening in the neighborhood,’” he said.

Ortega went to go check it out.

Staff writer Robert Gundran contributed to this report.