Posted on 01/09/2005 6:57:51 AM PST by Elle Bee
| Third explosion in eight days injures three |
Alex Sanz/Eyewitness News
Saturday's blasts marked the third such incidents since New Year's Eve last Friday. The explosions occurred underground on West Market Street where it meets Capitol Avenue, and sent three people to the hospital with minor injuries.
"We had what I consider a major explosion. It sounded literally like a sonic boom." said Indianapolis firefighter John Harding.
The force of the blast shattered store-front windows, ripped gashes in concrete floors and shook buildings for blocks.
Witness Jack Bayt recalled, "You can see the glass and the door frame laying on the street."
Tonight, the city's third underground explosion in eight days is raising serious questions. Why has it happened again? The power company maintains its system is safe. But the city's fire chief is demanding answers. And he wants them before more people are hurt.
"This many, close together, we need to take a look at that and assess what's going on." state Indianapolis Fire Chief James Greeson, "I mean, if this had been a weekday, it could've been much worse."
The explosion destroyed a long-standing West Market Street bookstore. And made a mess of things at next-door businesses.
It came three days after a series of explosions blocks away forced I-P-L to cut power to hundreds.
No one is sure, but there is speculation heavy rains contributed to a short circuit in underground power lines.
And who can forget that New Year's Eve blast on East Market Street that filled the Downtown skyline with columns of smoke? The culprit there, according to officials, was an underground transformer fire.
Throughout the afternoon, shaken witnesses, many lucky to have walked away unharmed, stared in amazement. "Exactly what caused it or what happened to initiate that incident I can't say yet." says Roderick Conwell with Indianapolis Power & Light, "Exactly what caused it or what happened to initiate that incident I can't say yet."
No one is sure, but tonight there is speculation, today's melting snow may have played a role in the explosion.
"Any incident like this is unfortunate for us as well as for the city." says Conwell.
Tonight, the fire chief is meeting with the power company and a number of city agencies to get to the bottom of these explosions and the fire department will have a news conference at 8:30pm.
As he said in our report, had this happened during the week, or even during tomorrow's Colts game, it could have been much, much worse.
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Or is someone simply not a Colts fan?
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These people are in denial as to the most likely cause....jihad. They need to pull their heads out of their a$$ and start rounding up their al qaeda cells.
We had similar occurences here on the northside of Richmond back in October and November. No one knows what it was, and although two teenage boys were charged with making explosive devices, the "booms" continued after they were icarcerated.That would be Richmond, VA
I am sure some "Muslim" is down there stopping up the drains.(/sarcasm)Are there any bronco Muslims?
Oh yes, there is a large Muslim community in Indianapolis, just as there is just about every major city in the US.
About twice a year an explosion in the power lines will blow the manhole cover up on E st NW or up in Georgetown . Washington DC .
All joking aside, Indy received incredible amounts of rain preceding the blasts, which were pipe/transformer explosions attributed to short circuits caused by the massive rainwater runoff.
Today it will be in the mid 40's in Indianapolis, and partly sunny--perfect weather for playoff football. If only our soon-to-be-built open-air stadium were available for a game like this. Go Colts!
I resized mine. Thanks.
Now thats strange. I deleted the 450K file form my server, re-loaded the smaller image, and it still shows the larger file size in Element Properties.
I seem to have problem with an image file. Any advice?
I see you caught MY mistake with the name --- damned paintShopPro --- It saved it with a capital "I" that I didn't catch when I uploaded it!
Does this still come up as a 453K file?
Is that sized to 50 x 74; it looks too elongated, c.
No, its 50x80, which looks right on my screen.
The image above is 50x90 and is different from the one below, which is 50x80
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