A bloodied survivor of the Texas fertilizer plant blast has told how the explosion destroyed an entire street and how he was lucky to survive.
Speaking next to an emergency triage station that was hastily set up in a football field last night, Dr George Smith described the apocalyptic scenes around the town of West.
'The windows came in on me, the roof came in on me, the ceiling came in and I worked my way out to go get some more help,' he explained.
'The ambulance station and the whole 1500 block of Stillmeadow is badly damaged, which is the closest street to it,' he told NBC News.
'My son lives there - he was on the second floor when it fell down, it would have fallen on him. That whole street is gone.'
Speaking next to an emergency triage station that was hastily set up in a football field last night, Dr George Smith described the apocalyptic scenes around the town of West.
'The windows came in on me, the roof came in on me, the ceiling came in and I worked my way out to go get some more help,' he explained.
'The ambulance station and the whole 1500 block of Stillmeadow is badly damaged, which is the closest street to it,' he told NBC News.
'My son lives there - he was on the second floor when it fell down, it would have fallen on him. That whole street is gone.'
Up to 15 people are feared dead and scores more are injured after the explosion ripped through a fertilizer plant near the town of West, Texas, at 7.50pm (CST) last night.
Debris, possessions thrown for miles and flattened buildings were seen on the streets closest to the blast.
Homes were being painted with Xs in a variety of colors, according to the Waco Tribune — the mark that rescue teams had searched the buildings for victims.
The newspaper said they didn't know significance of what the various colors mean.
Witnesses told of their scramble to survive and save others in the small farming community 20 miles from Waco.
'It just sucked you in and just threw you to the ground,' Crystal Jerigan told TODAY, describing how she grabbed her two daughters out of a car and dove through the front door of their house.
'About the time that I got to the car, you could hear the boom and within seconds, it just sucked you in and just threw you to the ground.'
The blast occurred close to the West Rest Haven Nursing Home. Images revealed first-responders desperately trying to evacuate the home's 133 elderly and infirm residents, some in wheelchairs.
Nurse Jill Jenkins rushed to the scene to try and help.
'It actually looked like 9-11, what you saw on TV with 9-11. There were people laying in their yards that had been blown out of their homes,' she told the broadcaster.
'The nursing home looked like it had just been blown kind of out.'
She said a neighboring apartment structure remained standing but the interior had been completely wiped out.
'People were coming out bloody and injured,' she said, adding that many were suffering head injuries.
'It's a lot of devastation. I've never seen anything like this,' McLennan County Sheriff Parnell McNamara said. 'It looks like a war zone with all the debris.'
Fire crews are desperately battling to rescue people still thought to be trapped.
Between three and five firefighters responding to the scene have been reported missing.
Local resident Sammy Chavez was seen standing in his town in a blood-stained t-shirt - in disbelief at what had happened.
'I just saw the explosion and then after that I took off running and then I saw the rest home and people were buried under the West Home, the West Home was gone,' he explained.
He said he helped evacuate the home and get critical residents medical attention.
Among the other seriously damaged buildings was a housing complex with a collapsed roof and a nearby middle school.
In the hours after the blast, many of the town's residents wandered the streets searching for shelter.
Among them was Julie Zahirniako, who said she and her son, Anthony, had been playing at a school playground near the fertilizer plant when the explosion hit.
She was walking the track, he was kicking a football.
The explosion threw her son four feet in the air, breaking his ribs. She saw people running and the roof of the school lifted into the air.
'The fire was so high,' she said. 'It was just as loud as it could be. The ground and everything was shaking.'
One man's amateur footage has come to be the defining film of the explosion.
Derrick Hurtt was filming the fire from his van with his daughter Khloey, 12.
The blast rocks the car and the force throws the camera from his hands. His daughter is heard pleading, 'daddy get out of here'.
He spoke to Today and said he knew many of those feared dead in the tight-knit community.
'It was a pretty horrific scene, some of the injuries we saw,' he said.
'There was probably double-digit people standing in front of me videoing that were closer than I was, and after the blast, they were nowhere to be seen.'
The explosion caused a ground tremor equivalent to a magnitude-2.1 earthquake, according to the United States Geological Service.
'I’m pretty sure it lifted the truck off the ground,’ he added. 'It just blew me over on top of her. It all happened so quick that things just kind of went black for a moment.'
Both were lucky to escape unharmed.
Jody Claridy, who witnessed the blast told told of how it felt like the 'whole building lifted up off the foundation.'
She told the BBC: 'We saw this huge mushroom cloud, a huge black wall of debris and women with babies walking out of it.'
'Buildings were demolished, windows were blown completely out of houses, doors were blown out or cracked - I've never seen anything like it in my life.'
Lydia Zimmerman told KWTX-TV that she, her husband and daughter were in their garden in Bynum, 13 miles from West, when they heard the blast.
'It sounded like three bombs going off very close to us,' she said.
Jason Shelton, 33, a father-of-two who lives less than a mile (1.6km) from the plant, said he heard fire trucks heading toward the facility five minutes before the explosion, and felt the concussion from the blast as he stood on his front porch.
'My windows started rattling and my kids screaming,' Shelton told Reuters.
'The screen door hit me in the forehead... and all the screens blew off my windows.'
Erick Perez, 21, of West, was playing basketball at a nearby school when the fire started.
He and his friends carried on with their game, but the smoke changed color about half an hour later.
The blast threw him, his nephew and others to the ground and showered the area with hot embers, shrapnel and debris.
'I was about 200ft (60.9 metres) from the explosion,' he said.
'We were playing basketball and then they told us to move out, so we moved out to the school and we're sitting there watching the fire, and obviously a big old explosion happened.
'And then we hit the deck and ran out of there as fast as we could.
'It was a giant force of pressure just pushing me back. And there was shrapnel flying everywhere from the explosion.
'I haven't been, stopped shaking since the whole thing happened. It's probably the worst thing I've ever seen in my life.'
Crystal Ledane, told NBC News how she fled with her children after the explosion blew out the doors and windows of her home.
'We just jumped in the car. None of us had any shoes on, we just got out of there. Everything is just completely chaotic.
'I’ve heard from firefighters... from their families... that they didn’t make it.
She added: 'You could just hear screaming through the town.
'It is a very close-knit town, everyone has grown up around here. This town is going to be dealing with this for many, many years to come. We’re all going to be affected greatly by this tragedy.'
Medical staff said they were dealing with 'injuries you'd normally see on the battlefield', reported Sky News.
West Mayor Tommy Muska told reporters that his town of about 2,800 residents needs 'your prayers'.
A search for survivors continued throughout the night, as emergency workers went house to house and business to business looking for people trapped in the rubble.
A towering plume of smoke was visible for miles around, after the explosion 20 miles north of Waco.
One pilot said his plane had been shaken from the force of the blast, said Sky News.
Teacher Debby Marak told the Associated Press that she noticed a lot of smoke in the area across town near the plant after her class finished.
She drove over to see what was happening, where two boys came running toward her screaming that the authorities had ordered everyone out because the plant was going to explode.
She had driven only about a block away when it did.
'It was like being in a tornado,' Marak, 58, said. 'Stuff was flying everywhere. It blew out my windshield.'
'It was like the whole earth shook.'
Buildings within a five-block radius are said to be damaged.
Texas Department of Public Safety D.L. Wilson said during a midnight press conference that it will be some time before authorities know the full extent of the loss of life and damage.
Baylor University students held a candle light vigil outside Waco Hall for the victims.
West Emergency Medical Services director Dr George Smith at first said that 60 to 70 people may have been killed in the explosion.
Police have so far refused to confirm those numbers.
Firefighters are battling a toxic cloud of noxious ammonium nitrate that is hindering their efforts to completely put out the blaze.
Glenn A. Robinson, the chief executive of Hillcrest Baptist Medical Center in Waco, told CNN his hospital had received 66 injured people for treatment, including 38 who were seriously hurt.
He said the injuries included blast injuries, orthopedic injuries, large wounds and a lot of lacerations and cuts.
The hospital has set up a hotline for families of the victims to get information, he said.
Debris, possessions thrown for miles and flattened buildings were seen on the streets closest to the blast.
Homes were being painted with Xs in a variety of colors, according to the Waco Tribune — the mark that rescue teams had searched the buildings for victims.
The newspaper said they didn't know significance of what the various colors mean.
Witnesses told of their scramble to survive and save others in the small farming community 20 miles from Waco.
'It just sucked you in and just threw you to the ground,' Crystal Jerigan told TODAY, describing how she grabbed her two daughters out of a car and dove through the front door of their house.
'About the time that I got to the car, you could hear the boom and within seconds, it just sucked you in and just threw you to the ground.'
The blast occurred close to the West Rest Haven Nursing Home. Images revealed first-responders desperately trying to evacuate the home's 133 elderly and infirm residents, some in wheelchairs.
Nurse Jill Jenkins rushed to the scene to try and help.
'It actually looked like 9-11, what you saw on TV with 9-11. There were people laying in their yards that had been blown out of their homes,' she told the broadcaster.
'The nursing home looked like it had just been blown kind of out.'
She said a neighboring apartment structure remained standing but the interior had been completely wiped out.
'People were coming out bloody and injured,' she said, adding that many were suffering head injuries.
'It's a lot of devastation. I've never seen anything like this,' McLennan County Sheriff Parnell McNamara said. 'It looks like a war zone with all the debris.'
Fire crews are desperately battling to rescue people still thought to be trapped.
Between three and five firefighters responding to the scene have been reported missing.
Local resident Sammy Chavez was seen standing in his town in a blood-stained t-shirt - in disbelief at what had happened.
'I just saw the explosion and then after that I took off running and then I saw the rest home and people were buried under the West Home, the West Home was gone,' he explained.
He said he helped evacuate the home and get critical residents medical attention.
Among the other seriously damaged buildings was a housing complex with a collapsed roof and a nearby middle school.
In the hours after the blast, many of the town's residents wandered the streets searching for shelter.
Among them was Julie Zahirniako, who said she and her son, Anthony, had been playing at a school playground near the fertilizer plant when the explosion hit.
She was walking the track, he was kicking a football.
The explosion threw her son four feet in the air, breaking his ribs. She saw people running and the roof of the school lifted into the air.
'The fire was so high,' she said. 'It was just as loud as it could be. The ground and everything was shaking.'
One man's amateur footage has come to be the defining film of the explosion.
Derrick Hurtt was filming the fire from his van with his daughter Khloey, 12.
The blast rocks the car and the force throws the camera from his hands. His daughter is heard pleading, 'daddy get out of here'.
He spoke to Today and said he knew many of those feared dead in the tight-knit community.
'It was a pretty horrific scene, some of the injuries we saw,' he said.
'There was probably double-digit people standing in front of me videoing that were closer than I was, and after the blast, they were nowhere to be seen.'
The explosion caused a ground tremor equivalent to a magnitude-2.1 earthquake, according to the United States Geological Service.
'I’m pretty sure it lifted the truck off the ground,’ he added. 'It just blew me over on top of her. It all happened so quick that things just kind of went black for a moment.'
Both were lucky to escape unharmed.
Jody Claridy, who witnessed the blast told told of how it felt like the 'whole building lifted up off the foundation.'
She told the BBC: 'We saw this huge mushroom cloud, a huge black wall of debris and women with babies walking out of it.'
'Buildings were demolished, windows were blown completely out of houses, doors were blown out or cracked - I've never seen anything like it in my life.'
Lydia Zimmerman told KWTX-TV that she, her husband and daughter were in their garden in Bynum, 13 miles from West, when they heard the blast.
'It sounded like three bombs going off very close to us,' she said.
Jason Shelton, 33, a father-of-two who lives less than a mile (1.6km) from the plant, said he heard fire trucks heading toward the facility five minutes before the explosion, and felt the concussion from the blast as he stood on his front porch.
'My windows started rattling and my kids screaming,' Shelton told Reuters.
'The screen door hit me in the forehead... and all the screens blew off my windows.'
Erick Perez, 21, of West, was playing basketball at a nearby school when the fire started.
He and his friends carried on with their game, but the smoke changed color about half an hour later.
The blast threw him, his nephew and others to the ground and showered the area with hot embers, shrapnel and debris.
'I was about 200ft (60.9 metres) from the explosion,' he said.
'We were playing basketball and then they told us to move out, so we moved out to the school and we're sitting there watching the fire, and obviously a big old explosion happened.
'And then we hit the deck and ran out of there as fast as we could.
'It was a giant force of pressure just pushing me back. And there was shrapnel flying everywhere from the explosion.
'I haven't been, stopped shaking since the whole thing happened. It's probably the worst thing I've ever seen in my life.'
Crystal Ledane, told NBC News how she fled with her children after the explosion blew out the doors and windows of her home.
'We just jumped in the car. None of us had any shoes on, we just got out of there. Everything is just completely chaotic.
'I’ve heard from firefighters... from their families... that they didn’t make it.
She added: 'You could just hear screaming through the town.
'It is a very close-knit town, everyone has grown up around here. This town is going to be dealing with this for many, many years to come. We’re all going to be affected greatly by this tragedy.'
Medical staff said they were dealing with 'injuries you'd normally see on the battlefield', reported Sky News.
West Mayor Tommy Muska told reporters that his town of about 2,800 residents needs 'your prayers'.
A search for survivors continued throughout the night, as emergency workers went house to house and business to business looking for people trapped in the rubble.
A towering plume of smoke was visible for miles around, after the explosion 20 miles north of Waco.
One pilot said his plane had been shaken from the force of the blast, said Sky News.
Teacher Debby Marak told the Associated Press that she noticed a lot of smoke in the area across town near the plant after her class finished.
She drove over to see what was happening, where two boys came running toward her screaming that the authorities had ordered everyone out because the plant was going to explode.
She had driven only about a block away when it did.
'It was like being in a tornado,' Marak, 58, said. 'Stuff was flying everywhere. It blew out my windshield.'
'It was like the whole earth shook.'
Buildings within a five-block radius are said to be damaged.
Texas Department of Public Safety D.L. Wilson said during a midnight press conference that it will be some time before authorities know the full extent of the loss of life and damage.
Baylor University students held a candle light vigil outside Waco Hall for the victims.
West Emergency Medical Services director Dr George Smith at first said that 60 to 70 people may have been killed in the explosion.
Police have so far refused to confirm those numbers.
Firefighters are battling a toxic cloud of noxious ammonium nitrate that is hindering their efforts to completely put out the blaze.
Glenn A. Robinson, the chief executive of Hillcrest Baptist Medical Center in Waco, told CNN his hospital had received 66 injured people for treatment, including 38 who were seriously hurt.
He said the injuries included blast injuries, orthopedic injuries, large wounds and a lot of lacerations and cuts.
The hospital has set up a hotline for families of the victims to get information, he said.
Source: DailyMail
Comments
Post a Comment