1 dead, 2 injured in house explosion in Wonder Lake, Illinois
One person is dead, and two others were hospitalized, in a home explosion in Wonder Lake, Illinois, far northwest of Chicago Sunday night.
At 7:50 p.m. Sunday, the Wonder Lake Fire Protection District was called for a house explosion in the 7400 block of Birch Drive, near Wonder Lake Road.
A box alarm was called to bring extra crews and EMS to the scene through a mutual aid response.
First responders arrived to find a pile of burning debris.
"It was just a stream of flame coming out of one of the pipes in the house, going straight up," neighbor Kris Gordon said.
One person died at the scene, the fire protection district said. This person's identity has not been released.
Two others were injured, the McHenry County Sheriff's Department said. A 76-year-old man and a 28-year-old man were both taken to Loyola University Medical Center with serious injuries, according to the sheriff.
Neighbors said they heard a large boom, and when they went outside, they saw smoke billowing from the home.
"I thought a transformer exploded, until my grandma went to talk to our neighbors, and they were like, 'Yeah, a house exploded,'" said neighbor Gillian Bass. "I'm like, 'Really?' I'm like, I had no idea a house exploded, and I thought that it was, again, a transformer or some kind of power line that exploded."
Richard Norman had a similar experience.
"We were just relaxing on the couch, just winding down from a long, action-packed weekend, and the next thing we know, the entire house shook," said Norman, "and we ran out of the door as fast as we could to see what happened, and we see nothing but rubble left standing in place of the house that we've seen for years."
Gordon said he can barely believe how the blast scattered debris up and down the block.
"That's the roof from that house on the other house," he said. "I mean, you can see it on the roofs all over. I mean, look, their front door is right there in that yard."
Gordon estimated the front door flew about 150 feet.
He lives five houses away, but said the explosion was still enough to rattle everything on the walls of his house. His neighbors felt it, too.
Dave Schultheis said he heard the massive boom before seeing smoke and debris flying through the area.
"Like a cannon shot going off," he said.
He had no doubt that the noise he heard was something serious.
"About a little after 7:30 last night, we were watching TV, and just a loud explosion — windows and everything. Just, we knew it was not fireworks. Jumped up off the couch, looked out the window, and you could see debris falling from the sky, boards, shingles, papers on fire," Schultheis said. "With that, we went out the front door. There was papers lit coming down out of the air on our deck, in our lawn, and a handful of documents from someone's mortgage that we have collected. So they're at our house if they need them."
Cyrena Sutherland encountered a horrific sight.
"I showed up, the house was in shambles," Sutherland said, "and I saw the son out there crying about his parents, so I went to give him a hug to comfort him, and I realized he was covered in burns himself."
Neighbors said a couple and their adult son lived in the home.
"The son was – we pulled from the rubble and helped get him out. The father was, yeah. I mean, he was crawling out from all the debris," Norman said.
Long after the blast, Gordon was still shaken and worried for his neighbors.
"I mean, it was amazing that they found anybody alive," Gordon said. "I just hope, through the grace of God, they're okay."
Schultheis said the situation was very sad.
"It's a shock to see how much damage and other people, the carnage that is created from it," he said.
Two nearby homes were also damaged in the explosion. An investigation by the Wonder Lake Fire Protection District and the McHenry County Coroner's Office is ongoing.