LUTZ, Fla. — Friends and family say a woman is lucky to be alive after surviving a propane explosion just feet from where she was standing.
The blast had people that live on the 3400 block of Melissa Country Way in Lutz running out of their homes. The described a loud boom and then felt their houses shake.
“The whole house shook, it was terrifying,” Susan Goodwin said. “The garage doors are mangled and blown up all the windows and doors across the back are blown out.”
A mother and her daughter, along with three dogs were inside the home when the blast happened.
The victim’s daughter told us her mom smelled gas and went to investigate when she got to the garage the laundry room next to where she was standing exploded. The homeowner told us she thinks her mom was shielded from the blast by a door and knocked down away from the fireball that erupted.
“As soon as that catches it just goes like a flash,” Eric Seidel the Public Information Officer for Hillsborough County Fire Rescue said. “You can see inside the house the walls some of the walls were pulled away from the foundation of the house.”
The injured woman is in her late 70s. Fire officials did not release their names.
Goodwin couldn’t believe how lucky her neighbor’s mom was.
“Her clothes looked almost burned off, her hair kind of singed, her face had some scratches her socks were blown right off of her feet,” Goodwin said. “If her mom had been in that room in the laundry room where the explosion appears to have taken place it probably would’ve killed her.”
Code enforcement is checking to see if the home is structurally safe. The cause of the propane leak and subsequent explosion is still under investigation.
