Payson, AZ – A massive gas explosion that blew some residents out of their shoes and vaporized their escape route engulfed a two-story apartment building at 201 E. Zurich St. at 8 p.m. Saturday.
Miraculously, no one was killed in the explosion heard all over Payson. Eight people were injured including two Alliant Gas employees investigating the leak hours after residents first reported smelling propane.
It’s just a miracle not many more were seriously injured and there were no fatalities, said Payson Police Chief Don Engler.
Jim Speiser posted a message saying his granddaughter was trapped in the bathroom of her second-story unit and her fiance was literally blown out of his shoes … Worst of all, the only staircase to escape was vaporized. We still don’t know how they got out, but they all did without so much as a scratch.
Hours earlier residents had called the fire department after smelling gas in the area. Firefighters investigated and then called in the gas company that services the propane lines throughout town.
The fire department units had left the scene by the time of the explosion, according to fire department officials. People by then had also been cleared to go back into the building, according to reports from residents.
Of the nine people in the building at the time of the explosion, six suffered injuries in addition to the two Alliant Gas employees. The injured included one pregnant woman and several children. One woman with burns was rushed to the Valley by helicopter. She was reportedly in stable condition as of Sunday, according to Engler. One other person reportedly spent the night in the Banner Payson Medical Center, said fire officials.
Adding to the confusion of the event, several Valley media outlets early on reported multiple fatalities. Those reports stoked concern for the several hours it took the Payson Police Department to track down everyone who had been in the building and issue a statement on the injuries.
Reports suggested that at least one pet remains missing.
The explosion damaged several power lines, knocking power out to residents in the area for several hours Saturday night.
The day before this explosion, firefighters were in the area of East Continental Drive, south of the hospital, after residents reported smelling gas. Alliant Gas is reportedly still looking into that report, according to fire department officials.
The Arizona Red Cross was on scene shortly after the incident. None of the residents needed housing assistance, as they found shelter with friends and family.
A Red Cross team will meet with residents and also go door to door in the neighborhood Monday to offer support services and pass out educational material about disasters.
The community rallied quickly to support the displaced families, who lost all their possessions in the fire. Shenoa Guesenberry and Caitlin Kovac established the Payson Crisis Relief Fund on Facebook to help the families.
We are taking donations of clothes, food, money, baby items, anything, Kovac said. All proceeds will go to the families that really need our help.
The online community immediately started to offer clothes and furniture to the victims.
There was a tremendous outpouring from the community, Engler said. People were stopping by to offer help.
Several Go Fund Me accounts have been established to help victims. One is called the Payson Apartment Fire Victims, which had raised $380 as of Monday. The Payson Explosion Recovery Fund had raised $610.
Speiser set up the Payson Explosion Recovery Fund on behalf of his granddaughter Savannah Bartlemus, who lived in the apartment with her fiance and two infant children on the second floor.
Speiser wrote that Savannah got trapped in the bathroom after the explosion and the door had to be smashed in to rescue her.
Payson officials have not officially determined the cause of the blast. Engler said a team of investigators from a variety of state and local agencies will seek the cause of the blast.
The scene of the fire on Saturday night had a strange, suspended quality as flames still appeared to rise from a gas line that served the apartment building.
It looks like a gas grill, said one resident of the curiously regular spacing of the tongues of flame rising from the ground.
Behind the flames, the apartment building lay crumpled in a heap with only the gable of the roof visible in the rubble.
The staircase that led up to the apartment building eerily led to nowhere.
Fire trucks from as far away as Globe came to assist in the emergency.
Engler said all hands were called in to help. We called to bring in enough medical and fire help for additional mutual aid, said Engler.
Hellsgate, Christopher-Kohl’s, Payson and Pine-Strawberry fire departments all responded, along with Tri-City, Claypool, Globe and Rural Metro departments.
DPS, ADOT and APS were all on scene along with an Alliant Gas truck.