A THUNDERING EXPLOSION BROUGHT SAN DIEGO TO A STOP Monday afternoon as people were shocked into wondering what happened.

The blast occurred in a seaside construction site where a luxury hotel is being built.  It was quickly determined that the explosion was the result of a natural gas buildup inside a 5th-floor utility room that was triggered by either an electrical spark or a boiler firebox.

Union-Tribune/Embry photo

About 400 construction workers were in the building when the 2:00 pm blast occurred, injuring 14, three of them seriously.  Nine of them were transported to the UCSD Medical Center burn unit and three of those were put into medically-induced comas while they were treated for burns.

The 1,190-room luxury hotel is located near the city’s convention center and was scheduled to open this December.  An early engineering appraisal shows that no serious structural damage occurred to the building, but the explosion blew out the face (curtain wall) of four floors.

AP/Poroy photo

The San Diego Union-Tribune has a good REPORT.

The Associated Press has this video report:

Union-Tribune graphic

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