Explosion at Pennsylvania storage building causes widespread damage to town

Building held dump trucks, snow ploughs, backhoes, and other types of road maintenance equipment, with damage estimated to cost millions

An explosion at a storage building in Rapho Township, Pennsylvania, has caused widespread damage to surrounding buildings in the area, including a number of homes.

Rapho Township Supervisor Jere Swarr told WGAL that no injuries have been reported.

An employee at the Lancaster County storage building smelled propane and spotted a heater that had fallen out of the ceiling, prompting the worker to leave the building. The propane ignited, destroying the main storage building. Mr Swarr compared it to a bomb being dropped.

The storage building held dump trucks, snow ploughs, backhoes, and other types of road maintenance equipment. The damage is estimated to cost millions.

The Rapho Township building where offices and conference rooms are located, about 150 feet (46 metres) from the storage building, also sustained major damage, Mr Swarr said.

Flying debris from the explosion damaged several homes in the area.

WGAL reported that viewers miles away from the area of the blast wrote in to say they felt the explosion.

Viewers in Lancaster, Columbia, East Hempfield, and West Hempfield townships, as well as in York County, wrote to the local TV station saying that they either felt or could hear the blast.

An explosion in Pennsylvania’s Rapho Township took place on 5 July (Screenshot / WGAL)

“The last blast this morning was felt at my house in East York. Any idea what it was?” one viewer asked.

“Whatever exploded at 971 N Colebrook Rd shook my home in Landisville by Hempfield High School. It must have been large,” another added.

“We live in Elizabethtown and we would feel an explosion. Our house rattled,” a third noted.

One viewer told WGAL in an email: “Explosion at a commercial building North Colebrook Rd and Hossler Road Rapho Twp Lancaster ... several explosions but definitely shook me out of bed.”

“What was the loud boom just before 6am in Mountville? It shook the house,” another viewer wrote in to ask.