USA-NEW YORK/COLLAPSE-MISSING New York East Village fire smolders while police seek two people still missing after explosion

Record ID: 216721

  • Title: USA-NEW YORK/COLLAPSE-MISSING New York East Village fire smolders while police seek two people still missing after explosion
  • Date: 27th March 2015
  • Summary: NEW YORK CITY, NEW YORK, UNITED STATES (MARCH 27, 2015) (REUTERS) POLICE BARRICADES, FIRE TRUCKS AND IN THE DISTANCE - RUBBLE AT THE SITE OF THE EXPLOSION RUBBLE AND SMOKE ST. MARK'S PL STREET SIGN RUBBLE IN THE DISTANCE PAN OF BUILDINGS ADJACENT TO THE EXPLOSION SITE AND RUBBLE FIRE TRUCK
  • Embargoed: 11th April 2015 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Topics: General
  • Reuters ID: LVA97HPDXZORMUPLVYTF2CPU40DW
  • Story Text: As smoke still smoldered at the site of an explosion that shook Manhattan's East Village neighborhood, two people remained unaccounted for on Friday (March 27).
    The apparent gas blast on Thursday (March 26) and ensuing fire destroyed four New York apartment buildings and injured 19 people. The explosion shook the neighborhood, causing two buildings to collapse and burst into flames. Two adjacent buildings caught fire as well.
    The blast appeared to have been gas-related, New York Mayor Bill de Blasio said. Private gas and plumbing work was going on in one of the buildings, and Con Edison utility inspectors on the scene an hour earlier had determined the work was not satisfactory.
    On Friday, the mayor and other officials inspected the devastated scene, where remains of the buildings were a tangled mess of bricks, wood, steel and broken glass. A few personal items were visible, including a mattress.
    Two people have been missing since the blast, officials said.
    "We are looking into two individuals who are apparently unaccounted for," said a New York Police Department spokeswoman.
    One of those was identified in local media as Nicholas Figueroa, 23, whose family said he had been eating lunch with a co-worker at a sushi restaurant where the explosion appeared to have originated.
    His family told The New York Times that a bank statement showed he had used a debit card to pay $13.04 (USD) to Sushi Park.
    Figueroa has not been heard from, his family said. His co-worker was hospitalized with injuries.
    Neighborhood residents that Reuters spoke to on Friday morning appeared shaken by the blast.
    "I was commuting across town when my niece called me and said - "Don't take the M-8 bus, take the 14." But even on the 14 bus I could see, I could see all the smoke, I could smell the smoke. And I just hope that no one died in this tragedy. I heard that two people have been missing and I hope they're on holiday is all I can say," said Lois Carlo.
    Tim Casey lives very close to the site of the explosion.
    "It's pretty surprising. It's pretty shocking. You don't anticipate that. They're a lot of old buildings around that same age and they've survived a 100 years or so. So it's kind of sad that it's gone," he said.
    Adrian Chernyk said he has lived his entire life in the East Village neighborhood and that he would often eat at the restaurant and eatery that were damaged by the fire -- Sushi Park and Pommes Frites.
    "I guess I'm just happy that I wasn't eating over there, at Sushi Park or at Pommes Frites. I think they had a similar thing that happened in Harlem last year as well. But I don' know whether you can really control for these things. I heard that it was just a gas explosion," Chernyk said.
    Arlynne Miller, another neighborhood resident, expressed concern at the ongoing construction in the area.
    "Anything like this that happens in New York -- it gives you pause. Especially because there's so much construction going on, it's very unsettling. Do they have the proper permits to be doing what they're doing? Are they using licensed people to do the work that's been done? The fact that ConEd was here an hour before the explosion, you have to wonder why were they here?" she said.
    The damaged buildings comprised 49 apartments, and the American Red Cross said 90 people registered for assistance.
    Firefighters were searching through rubble that was still burning.
    Two buildings entirely collapsed, a third mostly collapsed and will have to be razed and the fourth had severe fire damage but was structurally sound, according to fire officials.
    Con Edison said its inspectors had evaluated a gas service upgrade installed in the building that exploded and found it failed inspection partly because there was insufficient space for installation of a meter in the basement.
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