Queens House Explosion in South Ozone Park Kills One and Injures Eight Officers, Officials Say
A house that exploded and collapsed during a domestic-dispute call early Thursday left one man dead in the rubble, eight police officers injured and twenty neighbors displaced, and officials say the cause is still under investigation.
A Queens house exploded in a roar of flames just before 3 a.m. Thursday and collapsed, killing one man and injuring eight police officers who had responded to the home on a 911 call. Police had been called to the South Ozone Park house for a domestic dispute involving a man armed with a knife. Law enforcement officials believe the suspect, 50-year-old Anroop Parasram, intentionally set himself on fire; a body believed to be his was recovered from the rubble of the five-alarm, gas-fed fire on Thursday afternoon.
Seven police officers and a police sergeant were injured in the blast. The officers sustained minor burns, and the most severe injury was a head laceration that required stitches, Assistant Chief Christopher McIntosh, the NYPD's Commanding Officer of Patrol Borough Queens South, said in the department's account of the response. FDNY Chief of Department John Esposito said nearly 300 fire and EMS personnel responded to the scene.
The damage reached past the one address. Department of Buildings officials reported four civilian injuries, and the department issued full vacate orders for both homes adjacent to the collapsed house. The American Red Cross is assisting 15 adults and 5 children displaced by the explosion and fire, and the destroyed house was set to be fully demolished on Friday.
Police body-camera video of the explosion has been released, showing officers thrown through the air by the blast. What officials have not yet settled is the exact chain of events inside the house between the 911 call and the explosion; the cause of how the dispute triggered the fire remains under investigation.
