Possible breaking news, Boston, MA

Not sure what this is going to turn out to be, but I've never heard of anything like it. I work over night and monitor amateur radio repeaters in my scanner. All of a sudden, just about 5 minutes ago (about 0253 EST), all hell broke loose on several repeaters near Boston. A specific mention was made of something happening near the town of Danvers. Several hams have described an explosion so loud and powerful that it lifted cars off the ground and slammed them back down, from miles away from the town of Danvers. The most shocking things was a female ham, screaming into her radio and barely coherent, reporting that half an apartment building "vaporized" (her word) before her eyes down the street from where she was. She said there was no phone or cell phone service whereever she was, so she was relying on the ham radio to report it.

Nothing on local news channels, nothing on cnn.com, nothing unusual on this area's state police TRS, then again we are about 40 miles from that area.

[edit on 22-11-2006 by therainmaker]

UPDATE:

Hams on 145.470 repeater reporting all local public safety radio frequencies are so overwhelmed that they may start using a Red Cross repeater for medical use. Flames visible 15 miles away from whereever this incident happened. Our state police talkgroups are still silent...

[edit on 22-11-2006 by therainmaker]

Keep us posted, therainmaker

Oh crap.. doesn't sound good at all. Keep us updated if you can.

OK as of 0310 EST, what little I can hear of authorities in the area, they are referring to it as "the incident." Location is near Water Street in Danvers, MA. Red Cross has been activated and some Federal people are being requested from New York. Not sure who, I am only catching bits and pieces. Nothing on local news yet...

UPDATE:

Rumored Liquid Natural Gas terminal explosion, according to a ham who was speculating with another ham. Authorities are being vague still...

[edit on 22-11-2006 by therainmaker]

Is there sources that indicate this location where the "incident" has taken place has nuclear facilitys or of the likes that can create such an explosion?

Rumored Liquid Natural Gas terminal explosion, according to a ham who was speculating with another ham. Authorities are being vague still...

Just got that .

[edit on 22-11-2006 by 7Ayreon]

I'm looking at the Boston Webcams but have no idea what direction I should be looking. Any suggestions?

No, nothing like that close enough.

I am on the phone with a friend who is a police officer in Revere, MA, right now. They heard and felt the explosion, they don't know what it is, their radio repeater is fine and so are cell phones.

Hams on 2m and 70cm are relaying info, "the radius" is being evacuated, not sure what things are in radius of!

I hope everyone is alright.. but it'll be most unlikely people weren't in the vicinity..
very unfortunate.. wonder what the cause for this effect was?

OK the nature has been revealed, it was a gas facility explosion in Danvers. There is a short blurb scrolling across the bottom of the screen on local channel 5. There are still secondary explosions being reported on the ham bands. Unknown casualties, local news ticker said many homes destroyed.

EDIT: Thank you all for reading this thread. I feared the worst when I first heard the traffic on the ham radio, and thought I'd get the word out fast before I lost the Internet connection in case it was something real bad. That's why I chose the Skunk Works forum, just because I speculated the worst...thanks everyone!

[edit on 22-11-2006 by therainmaker]

Oh man. I didn't hear anything out here in Framingham where I go to school. My family lives closer to Danvers and I hope they're unharmed.

I'm looking at the area in google earth right now. I don't see anything like a gas storage facility around there. There's only one apartment building I can find nearby and it's surrounded by open grassland.

I've had an eerie feeling this morning, that's why I'm up at 3am. For the last hour I've been looking at an odd red glow in the sky from the direction of Tampa which is 80 miles away and I don't ever recall being able to see the lights from the city at night. I hope this is not going to be another day like September 11.

Originally posted by mythatsabigprobe

I've had an eerie feeling this morning, that's why I'm up at 3am.

That's a little strange. I have a very weird feeling right now and that's why I can't sleep. Hopefully the rest of the day goes smoothly.

Internet Incident Page is reporting a three alarm explosion and fire at Eastern Propane in Danvers. Fire command is reporting an explosion with heavy fire at 131 Waters Street and Jacobs Road. Multiple injuries are reported and command has also requested mutual aid from Peabody, Essex County, Glouchester, and Lynn Fire Departments. Command is also reporting two buildings fully involved on Waters Street which may have been caused by the propane explosion.

[edit on 11/22/2006 by gimmefootball400]

I live in the Uk and last year a simliar explosion at an oil depo in Hemel Hempstead happened. I live 70 miles north from there3 and was awoken to the explosion early sunday morning.

After deciding it must have been the evil doers attacking the UK yet again I was relieved to find out it was nothing but good ol corperate incompentance!!!

Unbelievlby no one was killed

Check out the link for some pics

link

(mod edit to reduce long url to a short link)

[edit on 22-11-2006 by pantha]

gimmefootball400 thank you so very much for that! My co-workers and I are still worried about the cause but we are relieved to have a second source of proof that it was a gas explosion.

It must be a large facility for the explosion to have taken out an apartment building. Thousands of gallons of propane is what was stored there is what I'm hearing.

Still waiting for this to come out on Google News, whilst browsing the web I found this website which seems to detail the destruction and demolition of places, one of them is titled Danvers Destruction Pictures!!!!

Since these take to long to download on a 56k Dial modem I don't know what they are. Anyone fancy having a look?

I'm assuming these are old photos of old buildings being knocked down but.....................You never no may have just stumbled on to a big conspiracy


Sorry fogot to post link!

www.abandonedbutnotforgotten.com...

Justv scroll down to Danvers

[edit on 22-11-2006 by Hope_for_reason]

Just found this report.......

Firefighters Battle Fire Near Boston
November 22nd, 2006 @ 1:59am

DANVERS, Mass. (AP) - Firefighters were battling a massive fire following an explosion Wednesday morning.

Police confirmed to The Associated Press that there had been an explosion, but could not immediately provide any further details.

The explosion occurred between 2:30 a.m. and 3 a.m. at a propane storage facility, a resident of the area told WBZ-AM radio. Other neighbors told the station that they thought either a plane had crashed in the area or there had been an earthquake.
www.ksl.com...

A Google Earth image of the facility.

Here's an update. Seems it was a chemical plant nearby and not the Propane storage facility after all. Scary for local residents all the same.

www.forbes.com...

I know what it's like to be so close to a huge blast as I live less than a mile - as the crow flies - from the Fuel depot that belw in Hemel Hempstead. Now THAT was a real brown trouser event

From the link provided by Britguy:

CAI Inc. makes solvents and inks.

There is an Eastern Propane facility close to the CAI facility, but that was not the cause of the explosion, said company spokesman Jeff Taylor. He said all the company's tanks are secure, although the property suffered some minor damage.

I checked Google Earth again and it looks like the large building in the picture I posted above is the CAI facility.

No loss of life reported yet, so that's some good news at least.
Looks like nothing more than an industrial accident.