'It sounded like a bomb or an airplane crash'

Explosion levels Scituate house, leaves one person dead

SCITUATE—A neighbor called Bay State Gas yesterday to report a strong odor of gas just minutes before a ranch house erupted in a massive explosion that killed one person, damaged seven other houses, and rattled windows for miles.

Don DiNunno, a spokesman for the gas company, said a technician had been dispatched and was on his way to check on the complaint when the company got another call saying the house had exploded.

Authorities said yesterday that they had yet to determine what caused the explosion. They did not release the identity of the victim, who they said had been inside the house when it was destroyed.

"It's an ongoing investigation," state Fire Marshal Stephen D. Coan said. "At this time, there has been a confirmed fatality."

Scituate's fire chief, Richard A. Judge, said the blast damaged seven nearby houses, four so severely that they will not be able to be occupied for some time. At least 15 to 20 people were displaced, he said.

The house where the blast occurred was obliterated, reduced to a charred pit billowing with white smoke. Clothing hung from tree branches in the yard on Turner Road, in a neighborhood of modest homes.

The owner of the home, Kim Chubbuck, was working at South Shore Hospital in Weymouth when she was called to the scene. She arrived in blue hospital scrubs, a coat wrapped around her.

"I don't know; we're just waiting," she said in a brief interview. "They won't let me go to the house yet."

Later, accompanied by several men, she walked down the street, past fire engines and police cruisers, stopping at a line of yellow police tape to survey the wreckage. She stared solemnly before walking away.

One neighbor, Edward D. Himelrick, said Chubbuck lived in the home with a male companion. He said he believed the man had been home in the morning because he saw his car parked out front.

But Himelrick said he was not sure whether the man was home at the time of the blast.

Chubbuck's son Everett, 23, who does not live at the home, was at a loss.

"It's out of our hands right now," he said by cellphone from his home in California. "It looks like Christmas is going to be at my house."

Neighbors were badly shaken. Ann Aries, a 77-year-old blind woman who lives next door to Chubbuck, was baking cranberry bread when the house exploded.

"I can't believe I got out of that house alive," she said. "I didn't have a single scratch on me."

Scituate officials said Aries house will probably be condemned. She spent last night with relatives in Scituate.

Others said the explosion was so loud they assumed it was an airplane crashing or a bomb going off. More than a few thought it was a terrorist attack.

"Oh, Lord, it scared me half to death," said Cindy Farrell, who heard the blast at Scotty's Market, almost a mile from the scene. "The entire store shook. People were coming out of their houses because of the vibration."

Himelrick was putting stamps on Christmas card envelopes in his house across the street when Chubbuck's house exploded.

The blast knocked pictures off his wall and shattered his windows. He ran outside and saw a towering fireball.

"It was like a bomb exploded around here," he said.

"It really went off pretty good. And I said, 'Holy cow, where's the house?' It literally blew the house apart."

Mirrors and picture frames also fell off the walls of the home of Anthony Antoniello, who lives behind Chubbuck.

"I ran outside, and the flames were roaring," he said.

"What an explosion it was. It sounded like a bomb or an airplane crash."

Added Mary Ellen Langan, 75, who lives nearby on Turner Road: "You would never know there was a house. It was just flames."

Although the Red Cross offered to open Scituate High School as a shelter, the displaced neighbors spent the night with friends or family.

Globe correspondents Gabrielle Dunn, Jenna Nierstedt, Anne Baker, and Casey Ramsdell contributed to this report. Levenson can be reached at mlevenson@globe.com; Sweeney at esweeney@globe.com