Being your one of Noe, I am so grateful for that and you keeping up info here, as well as Oorang,DrymansWife,Brent, your all the best!
We have truely missed you JP. I will hunt down the
article about the electrical grid that was apparently
sabatoged.
Blast at Long Island Car Dealership
New York Post
http://www.nypost.com/news/regionalnews/30258.htm
HELL ON WHEELS
By MICHAEL WHITE and ANDY GELLER
October 13, 2004 -- A fiery blast rocked the used-car showroom of a Long Island car dealership yesterday, collapsing part of the building and injuring nine people, officials said.
Employees rushed to pull colleagues from the rubble after the 3:47 p.m. explosion at Habberstad Nissan at 850 East Jericho Turnpike in Huntington.
Suffolk cops said it appeared the blast was a natural-gas explosion, but they were still investigating.
They said all the employees and customers had been accounted for.
Firefighters rushed into the wreckage to pull out three people trapped in the rubble.
"One person was underneath a desk with debris completely surrounding him," said Huntington Fire Chief John Glidden. "Another lady had debris all around her."
Glidden said nine people were taken to Huntington Hospital with non-life-threatening injuries that included bruises and fractures.
Hospital spokeswoman Helen Dudkewic said the nine were in "fairly good condition."
Part of the debris from the collapse fell on the busy Jericho Turnpike, blocking traffic during the evening rush hour. At least two lanes of the highway are expected to be reopened early this morning.
The blast occurred in the basement of the two-story showroom.
Cops said 15 people were inside the building at the time of the explosion, but did not know how many were on each floor.
U.B. Bhandary, the dealership's manager, said he was standing close to the spot where the explosion occurred when a customer called him away.
"Two seconds later, the blast occurred," he said. "Those two seconds saved my life."
Bhandary said there were 10 employees in the building at the time, four on the first floor and six on the second.
Customer-service rep Maryellen Schneider, who had to be pulled from the rubble, said, "I went flying backwards and everything came down on top of me.
"It was the scariest thing I've ever been in."