Explosion in Youngstown, Ohio, caused by crew cutting gas line they thought was off

YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio (AP) — A crew working in the basement area of an Ohio building intentionally cut a gas line not knowing it was pressurized before a deadly explosion this week, the National Transportation Safety Board said Friday.

NTSB board member Tom Chapman said preliminary investigation shows workers were in the basement to clear out piping and other outdated infrastructure and debris from the basement and vault area — which extends underneath the sidewalk next to the building — in anticipation of a city project to fill in the area and replace the sidewalks. A crew of five people and a supervisor had been on site that day and four of the workers were there when it happened, he said.

“It was an apparently abandoned service line coming off the main, which ran parallel to the street,” Chapman said.

He said workers smelled no gas before they started cutting the pipe and knew there was a problem when they made the third cut.