No common links between Plum home explosions, gas company says

Peoples natural gas company officials said Wednesday there does not appear to be a common denominator linking last weekend’s fatal house explosion in Plum with four previous blasts in the borough since the mid-1990s.

“At this point, there’s not any indication of any relationship,” said spokesman Nick Paradise, adding that the investigation into the latest explosion in the Rustic Ridge neighborhood is still in its early stages.

The Allegheny County Fire Marshal’s Office is the lead agency probing the blast in which six residents died. Authorities have said determining a cause could take months or years.

County spokeswoman Amie Downs said the fire marshal’s office would not comment about the Rustic Ridge explosion.

“Allegheny County Fire Marshal has no further information to share at this time, period,” Downs said. “Their work is underway on this case, and when we have additional detail to share, we will do so.

“Because of that, and the other one that is still pending, we would not be able to point to any common denominators.”

The fire marshal’s office also has yet to announce a cause of an April 2022 explosion on Hialeah Drive in Plum. That blast caused minor injuries. No one died. The investigation remains open.

Fire Chief James Sims, a 48-year veteran of the Holiday Park Volunteer Fire Department, said Wednesday he also did not believe that there was any single factor that linked the five explosions in the past 30-some years.

Sims, who is also the borough’s emergency management coordinator, was among the first responders at Rustic Ridge on Saturday and addressed the media shortly after the explosion.

On Wednesday, he was cryptic about the Hialeah Drive explosion.

“They have some thoughts on what occurred there,” he said.

Sims, a Plum resident since 1965, said it’s understandable that his neighbors are on edge following the tremendous explosion that spewed a fireball, annihilated a house on Rustic Ridge Drive, injured at least three people and damaged numerous properties in the subdivision.

“These are five separate events and have five separate reasons why the incidents occurred,” Sims said without elaborating.

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On March 5, 2008, a natural gas explosion obliterated a house on Mardi Gras Drive. One person was killed and a 4-year-old girl was hurt. The blast destroyed two additional houses, damaged 11 others and racked up $1 million in property losses.

And in the mid-1990s, there were explosions at two other homes within a year or so of each other, Sims said.

The National Transportation Safety Board, which investigates some pipeline accidents, determined that the probable cause of the 2008 blast was damage done five years earlier to a 2-inch natural gas distribution pipeline that occurred during a sewer line replacement.

In its final report, the agency found that the damage stripped the pipe’s protective coating, leaving it vulnerable to corrosion and failure.

Sims said he recalled two other house explosions in Plum, correcting an earlier statement that he had made overestimating the number.

Both incidents in the 1990s occurred in the borough’s Regency Park section on Regency Drive, Sims said.

One involved a homeowner who was trying to harm himself and caused a “small gas explosion.” The man survived but blew the bricks off the back of his house. Sims declined to provide details. No one was killed, there was no fire, and the house was rebuilt and still stands today, Sims said.

In the other Regency Drive blast, which occurred in 1996, an older woman was killed but her husband survived, according to Sims.

The county fire marshal investigated that incident. Sims deferred to the marshal for more information.

Downs said that the cause was a leak related to a gas company.

She did not have any further details about the two older cases because, she said, they occurred during a previous county administration. Any files, she said, would be in storage, “and it will take quite some time to locate and request them.”

Four volunteer fire departments — Holiday Park, Logans Ferry, Renton and Unity — serve Plum’s roughly 27,000 inhabitants. The borough sprawls across nearly 29 square miles and sits atop land crisscrossed with old coal mines. There also are several gas wells and a gas pipeline in the area.

Fire chiefs at the other three departments could not be reached for comment Wednesday.

Asked if he thought fracking, the old mine tunnels or any single factor played a role in the explosions over the years, Sims said he didn’t think so.

“I would say no. We know the cause of the Regency Drive event. We know what caused the Mardi Gras Drive event. I think the fire marshal’s office has some ideas and thoughts on the Hialeah event. And they’ll get to the bottom of the Rustic Ridge event,” Sims said. “They’re not connected. We know what happened.”

On Tuesday, two natural gas leaks were found in the Regency Park neighborhood. Peoples crews were dispatched to repair them.

Paradise, the Peoples spokesman, said utility crews are working with the fire marshal and the state’s Public Utility Commission as they probe the cause of the blast.

Pipeline safety engineers from the commission responded to the scene and are working with federal, state and local agencies.

The National Transportation Safety Board has not determined whether it will investigate the Rustic Ridge explosion.

Officials there are in touch with authorities on the ground in Plum, according to agency spokesman Keith Holloway.

The safety board is more likely to get involved if it is determined that the blast likely originated from factors outside the house that exploded rather than inside.

The fire marshal’s office confirmed late Monday that it is investigating the possibility that complications with a hot water tank contributed to the explosion at 141 Rustic Ridge, owned by Paul and Heather Oravitz.

Five adults – two of whom worked for Plum – and one child died in Saturday’s explosion.

Heather Oravitz, Plum’s director of community development, was 51. Her husband Paul, 56, who had lingered for several days in critical condition at UPMC Mercy’s burn unit, died Wednesday.

Also killed were Borough Manager Michael Thomas, 57; Casey Clontz, 38; his son, Keegan, 12; and Kevin Sebunia, 55. All were neighbors and inside the Oravitz home when it exploded.