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People are just ing stupid beyond comprehension.
Cleburne man told to stop lighting cigarettes before house explosion
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/...n/4958730.html
Associated Press
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CLEBURNE — A man whose wife died after their home exploded had been told not to light any more cigarettes nearly an hour before the blast, according to a city fire marshal's report.
After calling the Cleburne Fire Department's nonemergency number on May 29, David Pawlick told the fire inspector that "every time my wife lights a cigarette, a blue flame shoots up to the ceiling." Fire inspector Scott Oesch said he would check the problem and told Pawlick not to light any more matches, according to a memo written by Oesch two days later.
Oesch did not tell the family to leave the home — where authorities later discovered natural gas had seeped in but gone undetected.
Before the inspector arrived, Pawlick's wife, Hazel, said she wanted to smoke. So Pawlick lit a match for his wife's cigarette, but it went out after a blue flash. He lit another match, sparking an explosion of blue flames in the house, Fire Marshal Bill Wright reported.
Seconds later, flames went through the ceiling into the attic. Another more violent explosion then ripped a hole in the home's roof.
Five of the family members were injured. Hazel Pawlick, 64, died days later from her injuries.
Hazel Sanderson, the Pawlick's daughter, and her daughter, Stephanie Sanderson, remain in critical condition at Parkland Memorial Hospital in Dallas, said the family's attorney.
Pawlick is suing Atmos Energy and seeking unspecified damages. Family attorney Dean Jackson declined to comment on the inspector's claim about Pawlick being told not to light any more cigarettes.
"We are not going to know the sequence of events until we put people under oath and take depositions," Jackson said.
Atmos Energy spokesman Rand LaVonn said he could not comment on the report because of pending litigation.
The Pawlicks house did not use natural gas. But fire investigators say natural gas leaked from nearby and traveled into a sewer line leading into the house.
A condensation line from an air conditioning unit dropped into the sewer pipe. The result was an air conditioning unit that worked as a pump, sucking the natural gas from the sewer line and distributing it through the air conditioning ducts, Wright wrote.
No odor was detected from the gas because "after traveling that far through soil and water the mercaptan ... could be washed or scrubbed out by the filtering action of the soil," according to the report.
Last edited by Spurminator; 07-11-2007 at 09:46 AM.
People are just ing stupid beyond comprehension.
I think jail is the only place this guy will be safe from himself.
That would give me a good reason to stop smoking.
Send the prick to jail for manslaughter, at least.
ol' lady couldn't resist the allure of the "blue flame"
I guess smoking does kill ya
I wonder if these people own a pitbull.
He should have known better as well. I know people who are so desperate for a smoke, they'll endure freezing weather with rain for a puff. And how can you smoke at 7 in the morning. Jesus Christ now that's an addiction.
If blue flames are shooting to the roof usually when you light a match you think common sense would tell you "I shouldn't do that."
Common sense isn't so common though. Yes you would think that, and yet, look what happened.
If I lit a match, and blue flames shot through the roof, I would have called CPS the first time it happened, and then gotten the out of that house and stayed at my mom's or something until it got fixed. The thing is, why was the company out there as soon as they got the call? Why wasn't the gas shut off as well?
I'm not saying the company is responsible for these idiots actions, but they should have done something to protect these people from themselves as well.
I bet you a lawsuit may come out of this. Not saying it should, but it probably will.
Just in time for Darwin Award season.
And I'm glad to see this guy is trying to get some money out of this.
Where were they going to shut off the gas? Their house didn't use natural gas.
The article says one already has.I bet you a lawsuit may come out of this. Not saying it should, but it probably will.
And I figured you would be all in favor of this article, Mr. Explosion.
I favor deth metal, and all things metal and brutal.
However, they can shut off the gas sections at a time. Hey, I place blame on the guy, don't get me wrong. But I know a lawsuit when I see one, and this one had lawsuit written all over it, even if I didn't see that part if the article.
I could see where the gas company might have some liability since the leak itself wasn't caused by the Pawlicks... The fact that this explosion happened as a result of the Pawlicks being the biggest idiots on the planet was basically dumb luck for the gas company. But the explosion still could have eventually happened as a result of a variety of other things.
Exactly what I meant Spurminator.
When I read this in the Fort Worth paper I was like, you have got to be kidding me.
When I realized it happened in Cleburne, I said boy is that a shocker.
Basically Cleburnites arent the sharpest knives in the drawer.
I lit a match and blue flames shot out of my ass.
i love darwin.
I bet you're symmetric in that regard.
7:00am isn't that unusual at all .... a cup of coffee is one of the strongest triggers there are for cigarette smokers.
what if it's 6:30am with a joint in one hand and a beer in the other on the way to work?
oh, and i blame the coffee too.
oh, and i blame the coffee too.
Coffee & alcohol ... every time I've quit it's one of the two that always sucks me back in.
Good thing, too. Otherwise they'd probably stab themselves.
I've been a smoker since age 12 and I still cant bring myself to light up before 9am.... unless of course I've been up all night drinking that late.
Then again, its the same with alcohol/beer.... I cant bring myself to drink it until at least after 6:00pm..... unless I'm on vacation at the beach or some .
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