At least two people killed and multiple trapped as explosion rips through a Pennsylvania nursing home

At least two people were killed in a giant explosion at a nursing home in Pennsylvania, with social media videos showing black smoke billowing above the facility.

On Tuesday afternoon at around 2:17pm, the blast tore through the Bristol Health & Rehab Center in Bristol Township, which is just outside Philadelphia.

In addition to the fatalities, Governor Josh Shapiro announced in a press conference that multiple people have still not been found by first responders.

‘This is a very, very tragic moment for this community,’ Shapiro told reporters several hours after the disaster. ‘There are investigations underway as to what caused that explosion… We believe preliminarily that it was a gas leak that led to that.’

First responders and emergency management officials who were on site came to this conclusion because there was a strong smell of gas.

The gas leak theory will further looked into by investigators with the Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission, who arrived at the scene after the explosion, Shapiro said.

However, that will not be confirmed until the agency can examine the scene up close, Nils Hagen-Frederiksen, the press secretary at the Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission, told the Associated Press.

The explosion was labeled a mass casualty incident by Upper Makefield Township. Twenty-one people were injured, according to WPVI.

Law enforcement has asked the public to avoid the area while responders attend to the scene.

‘We understand that there are people trapped inside,’ Ruth Miller, a Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency spokesperson, previously told CBS Philadelphia.

The nursing home has 174 beds, according to its website, but it remains unclear how many patients and staffers were inside the building at the time of the explosion.

State Rep. Tina Davis, whose district includes the nursing home, described the scene after the explosion.

‘I saw smoke and I saw car after car after car was a fire truck or ambulance from all over the city, from all over,’ she told the AP.

‘It’s just so sad,’ Davis told the outlet. ‘It’s that hopeful time of year.’

‘This is just something that is sad for everybody and the families and the workers that are there. I hope there’s positive results from this. We don’t know at this point.’

District buses transported people from the nursing home’s emergency scene to a reunification center at nearby Truman High School. Officials worked on setting up beds and providing water, as well as other essentials to those in need. 

This comes as a clearer picture emerges of how this explosion may have happened. 

Musuline Watson, who said she is a certified nursing assistant at the nursing home, told WPVI that she smelled gas over the weekend.

It has also been revealed that the facility was not in compliance with several state regulations, according to the October state inspection report.

The inspection report did not say anything about gas leaks, but it did say the nursing home failed to maintain portable fire extinguishers on one of its three floors, according to the AP.

It also accused the facility of failing to provide ‘smoke barrier partitions’, which if installed properly can contain smoke to two floors.

Another concerning finding is that the facility did not properly store oxygen cylinders on two of the three floors. While oxygen is not flammable itself, oxygen can make gas fires burn more intensely, leading to explosions.

The facility last underwent a fire safety inspection in September 2024, according Medicare.gov. No issues were found.

However, Medicare rated the nursing home as ‘much below average’ thanks to shoddy health inspections.