A fire that destroyed a building which housed suppliers for the vaping industry caused multiple explosions that killed one person and injured a firefighter as the blasts rocked the US city of Detroit, sending gas canisters and debris shooting into the air, authorities said.
The debris fell as far as a mile away, the Clinton Township Police Department said on Facebook.
As the fire and explosions raged, authorities urged people in the area to stay inside after the explosions began at about 8.50pm on Monday. Officials said the fire was contained by late Monday.
Clinton Township fire chief Tim Duncan said that the building housed two businesses, one of them a distributor for the vaping industry called Goo which had more than 100,000 vape pens stored at the site.
He said a truckload of butane canisters had arrived within the past week at the building and more than half of that stock was still on site when the fire began.
A 19-year-old man died after being struck a quarter of a mile away by one of the canisters, he said, calling his death “very unfortunate”. Mr Duncan said it is believed the man was “just observing” the fire when he was struck.
“The person was essentially about a quarter of a mile down the road here and did suffer injury from one of these flying canisters,” Mr Duncan said at a news briefing.
He said the building also housed a business called Select Distributors that he said he believed supplied gas canisters for the local vaping industry for vape pens, along with other products. He said those canisters are believed to have accounted for the explosions that littered a large area with debris.
A firefighter was also injured when one of the canisters struck the windshield of a fire vehicle. The firefighter was believed to have been struck by glass and was treated and released from a hospital, Mr Duncan said.
Mr Duncan said that as he was driving to the fire scene his car was shaken repeatedly by the distant explosions of the gas canisters.
Mr Duncan said the cause of the fire was not yet known and firefighters had not yet been able to inspect the ruined building because it was unsafe as debris was still smoking.
White smoke and an orange glow could still be seen above the remnants of the building on Tuesday morning. Earlier, news helicopter videos showed a massive, bright orange area of fire with bursts of flames within the blaze that looked like explosions.
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