Sixteen people were injured in a huge explosion in a residential and commercial building in the German city of Eschweiler on Thursday evening. Two of them, including a baby a few weeks old, are in mortal danger, a police spokesman in Aachen reported on Friday morning. Four other people were seriously injured, ten were classified as slightly injured. The police and fire department assumed a gas explosion in the multi-storey house.
The force of the blast shattered all windows within a radius of 50 meters. Shops opposite the house from which the blast wave originated also lay in ruins.
Fire after explosion raged for hours
The explosion also started a fire that kept a large contingent of firefighters from the region busy for hours. The police and fire department received support from the Eschweiler Technical Relief Agency. The fire was extinguished around 2 a.m.
Risk of collapse must first be clarified
The explosion was reported around 9:15 p.m. Thursday night. Adjacent houses were also severely damaged by their violence. Whether the accident house itself or neighboring houses are in danger of collapsing must now be checked. Until then, residents are not allowed to return to their homes.
Authorities assumed it was an accident. So far there is no evidence of a crime, it said. The accident site was cordoned off over a large area. Fire experts had no more entered the stricken house than a structural engineer, it was said at night. The “Aachener Zeitung” had previously reported on the explosion.
Flood disaster caused major damage in 2021
Eschweiler is located between Aachen, Cologne and the North Eifel. The city has almost 56,000 inhabitants. The last major disaster there was not so long ago: in July 2021, the flood disaster hit the city. The Eschweiler Hospital alone, which had to be evacuated during a dramatic rescue operation, suffered damage of 120 million euros. With 1,400 employees, the hospital is the city’s largest employer.
Source: Krone
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