An explosion obliterated a house and killed one person, injured another and forced an evacuation of an entire neighborhood.
The home on Continental Court near Leonardine Avenue in the South River borough of New Jersey exploded on Thursday around 7pm, authorities said.
Arriving officials found two men with serious injuries.
The residence was ‘flattened out’, according to Mayor Peter Guindi.
‘It was a horrific scene,’ Guindi told MyCentralJersey.com.
‘Houses and cars around had windows blown out. Garage doors were pushed in. We didn’t know if there was anybody in the house.
‘All the houses were evacuated as soon as we got here.’
The fire was quickly extinguished. Neighbors were all safely evacuated and there were no other injuries reported.
Officials initially said two people died.
Kevin Gilbert, 62, a resident in the borough, was pronounced dead at the scene, stated South River Police Chief Mark Tinitigan and Middlesex County Prosecutor Yolanda Ciccone.
Another man was rushed to Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital. His condition and identity were not immediately known.
In the aftermath of the explosion and fire, two parts of the roof remained intact on the ground and debris littered the grassy yard and concrete road.
‘All of a sudden, boom. I mean, boom, boom,’ a neighbor told CBS News. ‘Like, the whole house, we thought something fell on the house. We really did.’
Another neighbor told the news outlet: ‘This was so powerful that it just, the house really shook. I really thought it was gonna be another earthquake.’
The cause of the fire remains under investigation.
Anyone with information on the incident is urged to contact the police department.
The South River explosion happened about a month-and-a-half after a home in Crescent Township, Pennsylvania, was ‘completely leveled’ by an explosion that killed a man and a woman. At least two other homes were damaged from the blast, which was felt in communities across the river.
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