OCR Text |
Show BYU rises to No. 1 with win over Wyoming .a. FEBRUARY 7, 2007 www iieraldextra.com YOUR TOWN -- - YOUR NEIGHBORS sports m 111 Wednesday i Utah Valley edition 50 CENTS YOUR NEWSPAPER (faff ii iiii r i lJXVUlLLLOviJ ' - 1 1 it '.,&13 l JV COBB CONOIEDaily Herald Firefighters work at the scene of a natural gas explosion at a home in Saratoga Springs on Tuesday. Natural gas causes explosion in Saratoga Springs killing homeowner ana a Questar Gas employee Caleb Warnock DAILY HERALD A massive natural gas explosion destroyed a Saratoga Springs home Tuesday afternoon, killing two people inside. April Roper, 24, who had moved into the home less than a month ago with her husband and daughter, and Larry Radford, an employee of Questar Gas, died in the blast, said Sgt. Spencer Cannon of the Utah County Sheriff's Office. The daughter of the homeowners was flown to an area hospital by med Questar spokesman Darren Shepherd said the company got a call about the leak around 1:30 p.m. Questar employees repaired the plastic gas line that serves the neighborhood and then evacuated nearby homes while it searched for gas. At about 4 p.m., after gas had been shut off to the home for about 25 minutes. Roper and Radford went into the basement of the home to turn on the water heater and furnace, Cannon said. Two minutes later, an explosion leveled most of the home, leaving only part of the three-ca- r garage standing. ical helicopter after suffering minor abrasions near her mouth, according to neighbors. The name of the daughter and husband of the victim were not released. The girl believed to be about 2 years old, was outside near the home when the explosion occurred. "We are just lucky more people haven't been hurt," said Cannon, noting debris from the home flew several hundred feet. The explosion happened after work crews punctured a natural gas line in the Harvest Meadows neighborhood near the home, Cannon said. Flames then engulfed the ruins. Because the remaining walls of the red brick home were unstable and swaying, crews had to wait at least two hours before they could begin slowly removing the debris to look for the victims, which were located minutes before 9 p.m. Shepherd said Questar is investigating the accident. "We're just saddened by the whole incident and until we can get a little more information we probably won't have much to say until then," he said. Eddie and Mindy Meyersick, who live in an adjacent home, said they were talking in their kitchen when the explosion happened. Eddie Meyersick ran to the scene, calling 911 on his cell phone as he went. He said he found the owner of the home weeping and screaming for his wife and 2007 LEGISLATURE House to teens: Hang up and drive f.i i HERALD Legislators are taking a stand: Teen drivers shan't be careening at around your local corner least not while they're on a cell . - THE phone. Lawmakers are concerned about teens who are driving while talking and text messaging. HB 217, which passed the House on Tuesday, restricts what minors can do with cell phones while they drive The bill would make the violation a secondary offense. According to Rep. Carol Moss, Lake City, texting while driving among teens has become a huge problem. "They even have an acronym," she said She says it's called TWD or "texting while driving." Moss reports that teens have related stories of crashing and nearly crashing due to drivers who were using their cell lt ZZD217 Sponsored by: astronaut Lisa Maria Nowak in March 2005 left and in an Orange County, Fla. Sheriffs Department photo. NASA Kory Holdaway, Cell Phone Restrictions for This bill Teen Drivers would make it Illegal for minors to drive while using a Houston, she lias a problem Mike Schneider and Erin McClam THE phones to text while on the road. The bill would make some exceptions for the teen drivers and their beloved cell phones. They will still be able to make calls during a medical emergency, report a safety hazard or request assistance relating to a criminal TEENS, ASSOCIATED A7 In ORLANDO, Fla. July, astronaut Lisa Nowak traveled 5.3 million miles in d mission to a put America's beleaguered single-minde- space shuttle program back on track. In February, she drove 900 miles on a different, but equalmisskm. According to police, her love for another astronaut led ly I Rtad mora: Other aettvif (? of the Legislature, M. M ASSOCIATED PRESS single-minde- d SALT LAKE CITY Brigham Young University officials have yanked an employee's addition to the official school Web site that sought to explain polygamy. Jim Engebretsen's Web page polygamy .byu. edu was posted over the weekend but came down Monday after officials said it violated university policy. Engebretsen did not have approval to post the "personal project" on the school site, said BYU spokeswoman Carrie Jenkins. her to drive from Houston to Orlando, bringing with her a trenchcoat and wig, armed with a BB gun and pepper spray, and wearing a diaper to avoid bathroom breaks on the arduous trip. Once In Florida, Nowak apparently confronted the woman she believed was her rival for theVfections of shuttle pilot William Ocfekin mar-Se- c ASTRONAUT, A4 - iriJ urtaSTVti ii SPORTS CI OUR TOWNS D1 BUSINESS OBITUARIES 04 At Dl TVGUIPf II EDITORIALS WEATHER WEB PAGE, A3 Clouds INSIDE (OH'-fuh-line- ). Nowak, a A3 PRESS See cell phone. See EXPLOSION, polygamy Web page Nathan Johnson DAH.Y See BYU pulls professor's K M v led the owner a distance away, afraid there would be another explosion. Meyersick said that as he ran toward the home, he was afraid he'd be hit by flying debris. A brown leather couch was flung onto the roof of a neighbor's home by the force of the explosion. Oak kitchen chairs and a child's booster seat could be seen on a nearby lawn. The family had just moved into the home about a month ago, said Mindy Meyersick. Anne White said she too was in her home, which looks into the backyard of the destroyed home, when the explosion happened. She ran to her window to find most of the home gone, and called 911. "I'm not kidding, this house just a OHM HIGH 46 LOW 29 6 mm VOLUME M ISSUE 191 "'"61055 0005 0 |