Explosion in Polish parish house kills 1, injures 7
Jan 27, 2023, 7:09 AM | Updated: 7:14 am
WARSAW, Poland (AP) — Officials in southern Poland said that a person was found dead Friday after an explosion demolished half of an old Evangelical parish house in the city of Katowice.
The explosion injured at least seven people, and one person remained missing, according to the regional governor.
Gov. Jaroslaw Wieczorek said two women initially were reported missing but firefighters found the body of one of them in the rubble shortly after noon.
Wieczorek said he hopes the other person will be found alive in the wreckage or safe at another location.
Firefighters say gas that was used for heating and cooking in the three-story brick house that belongs to the parish of the Savior most likely caused Friday morning’s explosion.
The deputy head of the region’s firefighters, senior Brigadier Miroslaw Synowiec, said a sniffer dog was participating in the search.
Witnesses told Polish media that small children were among the injured. They were all taken to a hospital.
A spokesperson for a children’s hospital in Katowice, Wojciech Gomolka, said two girls, ages 5 and 3, arrived with injuries to their limbs and heads and light burns, but were stable and conscious.
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