Investigators searched for clues Monday in the rubble of an explosion that damaged dozens of homes in a quiet Marengo neighborhood the day before, as restoration crews continued securing structures, tales of heroism emerged and many residents were left wondering what’s next.
Authorities on Monday upped the tally of seriously damaged houses to about 80, including 19 that have been deemed uninhabitable.
Marengo Police Chief Richard Solarz said it could be weeks before investigators determine what caused the blast that ripped through the McHenry County community shortly before 5 a.m. Sunday, rattling homes miles away and causing several fires but only a few minor injuries.
The family in the home where the explosion is believed to have occurred was out of town at the time, a family member said. That home was flattened, and debris could still be seen Monday blocks away.
The Illinois State Fire Marshal is handling the investigation, and Monday evening residents were gathered for an update from officials at Marengo Community High School, where the Red Cross has set up a clearinghouse for assistance.
Solarz said that in his 25 years as a Marengo police officer he has never seen such destruction.
Elijah Kues was asleep at his friend Eric Hamilton’s home in Marengo when he was awakened by the explosion, which shook the house and blew out the front door.
Wearing only shorts and a T-shirt, with no shoes, Kues said, he ran out of the house to see a large black plume of smoke “rising up in the air.”
“It was just, like, snowing insulation,” Hamilton said, recalling that the debris stung his eyes as he ran toward the explosion. He heard someone screaming that two people had been inside a two-story house that was now severely damaged and on fire, right next to the one that blew up.
Kues, an Elburn resident, said he began screaming for a ladder, which another man retrieved from his nearby garage. With the house engulfed in flames, Kues, his friend Hamilton and the man with the ladder helped two females get out of the house just before it collapsed, witnesses said. Kues said he later learned the two people he helped rescue were a woman and her teenage daughter.
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Hamilton said that as he and Kues ran to the site of the blast, he passed the home of his parents, who live a few doors away from the explosion. He saw them standing outside and asked them if they were OK as he ran past.
As he helped the mother and daughter, arriving at the scene before official responders, “I wasn’t thinking about myself. I was just thinking about getting other people out,” Hamilton said.
Though Hamilton’s parents, Debbie and Steve, were unscathed, their home was also badly damaged. On Monday, they sat on their front porch waiting for a structural inspector to tell them if it was still livable. The home they’ve lived in for 20 years was leaning to one side, its windows already boarded up.
“I heard a big boom,” Steve Hamilton recalled. “I looked out the window and saw flames.”
His wife said she ran downstairs to discover that drywall had been blown off the walls and the door blown open. The couple saw fire and people running and screaming.
Kevin Simons, his wife and two young daughters live across the street from the house that exploded. He said his wife thought a tornado had passed through.
He said neighbors have come together to try to help one another get through this.
“It’s a pretty tight neighborhood, and everybody is genuinely concerned about each other,” Simons said
After the explosion, about 20 families were taken to the high school for assistance, and though the Red Cross set up space for people to spend the night there as needed, all the displaced families found shelter elsewhere, an official said.
Solarz, the police chief, said it was “amazing … for an explosion of that magnitude” that no one was killed.
Still, he said recovery “will be a process. We will be here continually to help. Some houses will need to be knocked down and rebuilt from scratch.”
Amanda Marrazzo is a freelance reporter.