Added: 5 years ago
From: jseaton
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  • I was on Gloria Avenue when it happened. It looked llike the school was on fire. A fireball went dow our lane.

  • Wow I lived in Rivendale Way when this happened in 94

  • I was actually there when it happened. I live in Fords New Jersey witch is about 2 miles away from Durham Woods. It was early in the morning and I felt a shaking from the floor, like an Earth Quake. I woke-up and I looked outside my window the sky light up as day. You could hear a roaring sound outside. Fire blazing. When it was over the sky filled with ash and every-thing in Durham Woods was destroyed. It was all over the news. It was like having a missile drop from the sky.

  • You can see,and hear the fire in Middlesex,NJ.It sounded like a jet plane..That is a good 10 miles away.I remember that.Mutual aid was called in from all over that area.So many fire trucks

  • Who's music is in the end? Sounds amazing! :D

  • I would not want to look out my window and see THAT.

  • @GrizBearman I looked out of my window and saw that. It was like day, it was so bright!

  • Thanks for the footage. I never have and hope to never see flames that big!

  • Dude I wish they had technology back then that they do now. This is like the only video of this explosion. If this happened today there would like 300 videos of it.

  • Isn't it a bit weird to think that this is just a tine fraction of the raw energy the earth is full off?

  • looks like the hell is opening up. Thats why people go to church for 2000 years.

  • damn i was in middle school 8th grade i remember looking out my window and seeing it go up i was just looking out and boom there it went i live close to the quickcheck at that time that was hairy as hell

  • 3 b reading Rd....right in the front and still seemed like forever getting out

  • 55-P ill never forget that day

  • That's what a tornado sounds like. They should not build apt buildings next to a 20ft diameter gas line.

  • I was there I live in talmadge village I was there it was right in front of my house I'm 9 I was I kindergarten it was very scary I was crying because there was 2 cats and

    A puppy that was having baby I know because I went there everyday because she had to babysit me then we left and then bomb I heard a noice and a fire was behind us I was thinking it was a cookie monster and it was gonna eat us remember I was in kindergarten

  • I warned my kids about thier behaviour. "Remember, your behaviour; Daddy's got his bottle of Calor gas, and he will use it against ya if you fuck him around"

  • I lived less than 2 miles away in Edison Village apartments and remember this like it was yesterday. It was very scary!

  • WOW. We had a big gas line explosion here in Minneapolis. But nothing compared to what you witnessed.

  • It's actually better to let it burn like that. If you put a natural gas fire out, the gas will travel and build up. Any ignition source would spark something more catastrophic than this was.

  • how did it start what was the cause

  • God Bless all who had survived! Pray for the souls who were lost! All who make jokes about this, go get a life! @LorakelHD Shut up, and quit making jokes! What if you were stuck in this burning explosion? Huh? Go shut up and get a life! For all who died, god bless you and you shall have everlasting eternal life! God Bless all!

  • @airedalegirl99 Only 1 dead at Edison. But, 12 campers were burned to death in New Mexico in 2000 from a gas pipeline that failed near them.

  • @rawtorque there's nothing "only" about anyone being dead. It's all very tragic :(

  • ... I lived at Durham Woods from March 87 to October 94 ... I witnessed this event up-close ... my wife looked out the window, saw the flames, and said to me "Are we gonna die?" ... scariest thing I have ever experienced!

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  • i would connect water lines to the gas lines in a emerency like this it would flush it out

  • @forgotagain00 you sir become aN ENGINEER and do that idea of yours

  • chuck norris fart

  • my dad went on this fire call. my brother recorded it. and we are both firefighters now :D

  • Wow, I was there at a dance club in Jersey. We thought the explosion was the DJ's sound effects! People were freaking out; it looked like the sun was rising at 10pm. I mean some people were really freaking.

  • Salt caverns are going to be carved next to my subdivision for gas storage. There are also 4 prisons bordering the site. If an evacuation of the area becomes necessary, how are thousands of convicts and hundreds of guards going to be taken to safety? And to where? Holiday Inn?

  • The other thing that I remember was my mother saying that when she saw the orange light through her blinds, she thought, "Oh my God....Jesus is coming"

  • That was one hell of a scary night.You could actually see the shockwave pass over after the initial flash of bright orange.I lived at Mill Brook Village Apartments back then.The orange glow was pulsing like it was alive.A guy at work was reading a novel called "Swan Song" when the flash occured.He counted the seconds waiting to be obliterated, thinking that it was a nuclear war.

  • XD 4:44 i thought that truck was going straight into the fire. The fire looks like the sun is coming for Earth...

  • I lived 3 miles away at the time. I could read a newspaper on my front lawn at 1:00 am. That's how bright this was. Everyone was in a panic becuase it looked so close. I remember that even WPLJ from New York was giving out information about the blase.

  • Holy SHIT !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

  • Why would you watch arsenio?

  • @smartestmanonnet

    What can I say - it was the early 90s

  • There may be ways that we can lessen or eliminate the dangerousness of using natural gas, but still there lies the infrastructure problem of wasting resources and having to construct and repair.

  • I was 10 or 11 at the time and living in south plainfield. I remember waking up to a bright pink sky. Everything was lit up like day. Incredible.

  • I fought in this fire when I was a fireman in Nj. Thanks for the video

  • @jerseyrufneck That's one of those fires you'll never forget fighting!

  • Cool. Where was he in the video?

  • I was telling my kids about this today after watching the California explosion on the news. My dad lived there when this happened. I said to them while we were watching wouldn't it be weird if we saw him in this video. Only a few seconds later, he comes across the screen. What are the chances that he was in your video!

  • Who did the music for this?

  • My Fiance and I lived in the last damaged building that was standing, I thought it was a nuclear blast at first. We waited in bed and prayed we'd die quickly, the light was so bright and the sound was deafening..then I thought I heard a fireman say "evacuate" on a Bull horn. We ran to see if our imagination was playing games on us, then we saw the fireman running and yelling to evacuate, we grab our keys to our car and left. Our car was driving oddly and when we pulled over, we saw it burned.

  • I was in Berkeley Heights when the ground shook, the sky lit up. I headed back home to Chatham and I could see the fire from the heights. The flames shot into the sky and it was light daylight for hours.

  • Responded with Ridgefield Park Heavy Recue to relieve some of the other units that were there for hours. It looked like the playground scene in Terminator, cars were even melted .

  • My mom grew up in highland

  • and then hell opened up and ........

  • I was there ,newmarket fire co. I could not explane what we saw just drove untill we saw fire .... fire everywere

  • Wow, I remember this! I lived in Highland Falls, NY at the time, and I was in High School. I remember seeing this on the news and people talking about it in School afterwards.

    Awesome video, and I'm glad you weren't hurt.

  • my mom was mayor in metuchen when this happpened it was scary she said cuze evryone was frekin out !!! 1 died!!! heart attack

  • The fact that only one person died, and that was from a heart attack, remains incredible to me.

    A different gas line company was supposed to put something similar down the middle of Jamaica Bay in New York City. This happened, and they deep sixed the idea.

    I was able to see the flames from Belle Harbor/Neponsit, in Queens County, NYC NY.

  • @musiclvr7289 i know you commented a year ago but i thought i'd answer your question anyway since i know how it started.

    i'm not sure when he did it but, a guy had stolen a truck and then he got a backhoe or some other digging vehicle late one night to bury it with...he had hit the pipline and caused a fracture in it. over time, the fracture deteriorated and then this happened.

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  • @fadeaway100301 he tried to bury a truck??? and caused all this??? what an effin' yahoo....  did they ever catch the fool? if so, what ever happened with him?

  • i live in metuchen and i was 8 when this happened. somehow, i slept through the windows shaking and the roar in the sky *shrugs*. my dad said he was trying to call 911 because he thought it was one of the neighbors houses at first but he actually got a busy signal because so many other people were calling 911.

  • i live in Edison NJ not near Durham Woods Though

  • I was 5 when this happened and I lived in South Plainfield. I was pretty scared. It was fairly far away but it was still a loud roar and bright. I thought the world was ending!

  • correct me if I am wrong........no one actually died in this explosion?

  • @MRMILO57 No, I dont believe so. Amazing considering it happend at night in the middle of an apartment complex

  • @t80tank20 .....wow, yet so much damage. thanks

  • Natural gas is no joke. A natural gas explosion took out a K&W Cafeteria & Sheraton Motor Inn at 380 KNOLLwood Street in Winston-Salem, NC on 1/18/88 (NFL Julius Peppers*: 8th birthday). The address shouldnt be confused with the *page* RAMada at 380 EAST Washington 23803. Zip 23803 ends 803, matching the 803 telephone area code for Fairfiled County & the Midlands of South Carolina. Unrelated: Food Lion at 802 Harbour WEST in 27803- -another zip ending 803 with a street address one less at 802

  • RAINer HELLer: a guest at the Sheraton when the 1/18/88 natural gas explosion ripped at 380 KNOLLwood in Winston-Salem, NC & presumably unrelated to S.A. HELLer (b. SEP. 8, 1970; 148-60-5997 New Jersey) who died in Dec. 1992. The index didn*t show the school mate born on SEP. 8, 1970, but considering expiring in DurHAM, NC & the Interstate 85 corridor with I-85*s northern terminus at PETERSBURG, there could be a cosmic link to the 380 EAST WASHINGTON RAMADA, LEE Harvey Oswald not withstanding

  • I remember this like it was yesterday...My friend and I were way on the other side of town...anyone who knows Piscataway knows it's pretty big..we were hanging out on the train tracks having a couple beers (down near the Dunellen border, when I looked up and saw the initial fireball. We drove and drove..finally getting there, and we managed to get on 287...the paint on my friends car literally bubbled.

    It was so strange....there were people everywhere..kids, etc...in the middle of the night.

  • I was out there working around the clock for 2 days. That change the whole gas industry with laws and safety!!!

  • How far away from the explosion is the camera?

  • FEDERAL Q!!!

  • looks like my moms cooking

  • @insaniac00 lol on mother's day too!

  • i have an old vhs of this somewhere at my house from when i was a kid when this happened and it wasnt that far from where i lived, be thankful that there wasn't more deaths then that. the reason it took so long to detain was due to the fact i think that they had to turn off the gas all the way down is texas or something to get it to stop giving gas then they had to put out everything else that was on fire

  • @darksekretelove Fire fighters on the scene had to take turns shutting off the valve. The extreme heat caused them to rotate out after a few turns of the valve. It was causing their boots to melt. It took several hours to completely close it and the remaining gas in the line to burn away.

  • Over 100 residents were left homeless and one death occurred from a heart attack suffered by Sandra Snyder, who was unable to summon emergency workers "amid the chaos." Because the fire occurred so close to the Durham Woods complex, residents in the area also refer to it as the Durham Woods fire.

  • God i wish i knew who the real hero of this day was????

  • yeah right,  and I'm the tooth fairy.

  • This is crazy, I never knew they had footage of this... I was there... I was 5 at the time...

  • They,re planning a 42" natural gas pipeline through Jersey City and Bayonne. It's expected to be completed by 2013. Keep that thing away from my dwelling.

  • my girlfriend had my car worried sick. good god i rmember that night

  • my mom told me about this

  • you should post the one that happened in cleveland yesterday one house exploded and was totally demolished while over 50 others substained damage and according to the news 15 0f them will probably have to be demolished its a miracle nobody was killed.

  • I was 14 at the time. I actually slept through it, believe it or not ,but I remember the next day everyone was talking about it. A miracle that no one got hurt. One heart attack from a viewer and that was it

  • Wow...I was in there as well when this happened, although I was only two, so I don't remember it...thank god I don't remember it, after seeing this video...

  • great footage...i felt the shudder in Newark...then saw the glow..

  • I don't understand how it can burn for so long. aren't there, like, automatic shut-offs on these giant gas lines? If so, well, I'd say we need 'em

  • there is no current technology to have auto shut off valves for large natural gas lines. even if there are auto shut off valves for large natural gas lines it would be expensive.

  • I remember this event. I lived next door in the Rivendale Way apartment complex across from what was JobCore Compound. I was in the first grade. Memories! Two young friends of mine lost there home and possessions.

  • Impressive video!

  • I can recall having an argument about how unsafe natural and propane gas are, on a home repair FIDOnet discussion echo. The very next day.. THIS happened.

    Needless to say, gas is VERY dangerous. I'd rather live next to nuke plant than a gas pipeline.

  • isnt nuclear more dangerious then this? of coure! it can kill you will flying in the air and blow up and make ur fles burn so it has the same effect

  • I remember this explosion, it was a pretty large main natural gas line that exploded in the area.

    One of my co workers back then was the lead guy from OEM on scene there. From what I recall it was pretty remarkable that only one person died but not from the initial blast it was a heart attack or something from when he saw the flames.

  • God Damn

  • looks like iraq after a car bombing

  • Wow man this is a great video as far as the coverage goes. Great job. My mom lived in Blueberry Village when this happened and no lie, she slept through it. That's one oblivious mother!

  • Fucking huge explosion.. I'm planning on blowing 80 liters of gasoline.. (i live in Venezuela.. so 80 litres of gas is like 5 bucks or sumthin') my question would be... how far should I be? (i0m goin to detonate it with a RC detonator)...

  • I would say 1k at least! Lots of heat and a shock wave! Be very careful!!!

  • Wow really? thanks! i was gonna be 200m away! jesus hehehehe

  • I lived at Durham Woods when this explosion occurred. Fortunately, I was driving home from Avenel when my friend Scott and I saw the blaze from Route 1. At first, weI thought Menlo Park Mall was on fire, but as I got closer to home I could see it was definitely Durham Woods. Luckily, the apartment building I lived in was far enough away from the blaze and did not incur any damage. I lived at the complex for another year without further incident.

  • my dad is a cop and he was there helpin people evac and also makin sure no one was robbing the houses

  • I remember actually hearing that explosion as a kid and it scaring the shit out of me. We were reasonably far away from the fire, but close enough to hear it and see the sky glowing. At the time I was entirely convinced that someone had nuked us or some such and was totally freaked.

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  • dayum son!! that's a fire!! xD

  • It doesn't take long to forget.

  • I remember watching this from the top of the RWJ parking garage in New Brunswick. A friend named his band "Edison's Burning" after this.  It was unbelievable to watch.

  • Did anyone die?

  • From what I remember, 1 person, but it was from a heart attack.

  • WOW!!!!!!!!!!!

  • This was a Transmission natural gas pipeline 36 inches in diameter, I believe. Around 2,000 psi system, which was why the flames were sky high. They shut the gas off remotely. They have automation systems if something goes wrong, and to maintain pressure to cities surrounding this area.

  • did they ever manage to control this fire? :) and HOW?!

  • I still have nightmares about this. I did not live in the complex. I lived across town about 2 miles away. There was ash and crystallized dirt all over my car the next morning.

    Thanks for posting this.

  • i live right next to durham litteraly a 5 second walk and the damage its done is still left in the woods

  • i live live in edison nj but not at that time i move to nj in 1995 i was only 5 or 6 years old i love edison but now im o my god what happen it that time wow edison new now natual gas Explision now but me wow

  • Freakin' amazing. As gas usage goes up so does the inherent risks. There just is no perfect energy source, is there. Great video by-the-way.

  • search for "kuwait oil fires" !!! DESASTER

  • Hello....On March 23, 1994 - Believe it or not - I WAS THERE - I had just dropped off a package at a company less than 2 miles near the explosion. I had just turned to drive away when......

    I called on my CB radio - Breaker 9, etc Massive Explosion, Need Fire & Rescue Durham Woods....etc....Do you have any additional audio or video footage?

  • I think it's a gas station .

  • It's an apartment complex.

  • Read description, imb man!! :)

  • Creepy story man.

  • happened the fire alarm went off...u never realize how traumatizing sumthing is until u have to deal with it afterwards i cant take firedrills evn now n its so many years later...just devastating.....wrds cannot explain....

  • On sum real shit i lived in Durahm woods during the explosion...i was only four but i remember it vividly....my parents and I lived in the front so we werent affectd by it but we werent allowed back for a while....i remember them burning their hands,having to sleep on my grnadmothers floor that nite....everything u touched was hott, i remember the red cross set up a shelter for ppl left homeless by it and evn for those hu needed basic supplies....and the worst thing that cud ever happen

  • hehe 4:37 Middlesex xD

  • lol I live in pembrokeshire RIGHT NEXT TO A LNG REFINERY! If it go's my house will be in ground zero!

  • i live right off park ave i saw this shit from my backyard

  • like a sunrise...

  • Please

  • My Dad Was Telling me About This He Thought It was a nuke

  • Nice editing.

  • the aftermath of the natural gas explosion looks like the atom bomb aftermath in Hiroshima. everything destroyed. never seen anything like this before.

  • O.O

  • i slept through that.... i must have been like 8 years old... i remember a friend from schools house burnt down. only one person died from a heart attack... that's so much for posting this

  • this was 15 years ago tonight. i was 200 yds. from the blast. the video doesn't even begin to show the magnitude...

  • nice flare in the night...

  • god damn thats fucking intense

  • i lived 2 miles a way

  • abit scary...

  • Thanks for the video..I just watched this on tv on the Discovery Channel. I remember that night well, live about 12 miles away and you could see the flames and actually hear the roar of the fire. I remember putting on the local radio station WCTC and there were all kind of crazy reports, everything from Menlo Mall on fire too tanker accident on the pike. I work on New Durham Rd and a few days after this, I remember a flatbed truck parked in front of our building with burnt out cars piled on it.

  • thats like a nuke!!!!

  • Thats how the sun came to be but with different gasses so that was a new sun!!!!!!

  • Durham Woods still look the same

  • how do you put that shit out?!

  • my cousin was visiting hes friend near the powerplant, when he came back to here finland, he was red like devil

  • It's like... DAAAAMN! It looked like the end of the world, incredible footage.

  • what were on fire gas tanks or major pipeline ?

  • Major pipeline - a 36 foot section of the pipeline ruptured and caused the Massive explosion.

  • how did the explosion start?

  • i remember being in kindergarten when this happened.. and waking up with my bunkbed shaking.. It was one crazy night that I will never ever forget..i lived down the street from Durham Woods..

  • I remember this being on the news. New Jersey is a pretty rockin' state

  • i live in woodbridge and i saw the fireball in the sky. that was nuts. it scared the crap out of me.

  • cost of natural gas just went up by 15%

  • lol

  • yo i was three bout to be 4 years old wen dis happened nd i remember waking up to seeing da photo on my night stand shake and da bright light outside..cant believe der was only 1 death in dis whole thing..nd it was cuz a heart attack..we were very fortunate.=]]

  • I remeber this s well this place isnt far from where I am

  • i remember seeing this on the news here in NC when i was 22 y/o.... what actually caused the explosion?

  • Intense Fire

  • Cool video man, thanks.

  • INCREDIBLE......

  • I remember a few years ago being a fire in north shields at the time I was coming back from residential school

  • And the Emmy for the most Boreing Intro on Youtube goes too, OMG it's jseaton

  • I remember this. I was really young and it actually shook me out of bed. It was so scary... we all thought it was a bomb, and the sky was so bright, and all the birds were flying around like it was daytime. The sky was bright orange with a few smokey clouds. Gives me chills looking at this!

  • True. We don't give a flying turd what you think. Just show the clip then fuck off!

  • The full minute of text is boring. Get to it.

  • Back in the 90s folks had patience

  • Welcome to the 21st century

  • and then i was born 6 days after roflmao

    HERES some facts

    my parents were in edison and it was a 1/2 mile away probably less from our house. The first police man who actually went to the scene saw the paint on his car bubbling and reversed out. They said it was basically daylight the way it shone in the sky and it felt like 90 degrees when it was suppose to be 20 o.o im glad someone posted a video its like everyone forgot about this event

  • oh damn what happened?=(

  • i hope every1 was ok. that probly cost the city and state lots of mony

  • Remember that like it was yesterday, watching sportscenter, and the lights went out, i lived in Chesterfield, about a mile away. My room faced the opposite direction of the blaze so when i looked out the window, i just saw the glow of the fire off the other houses,I was 15 I swear i thought they droped a bomb, only time in my life i thought i was going to die. After about 30 seconds i knew it wasnt a bomb. The best was the next day working for Red Cross at EHS, that was a fun day as hell.

  • Definitely one of those moments that you don't think you'll ever forget. Amazing video. Thank you so much. I lived in the complex off New Durham by the Edison Garage, and watched in awe as the events unfolded. We thought it was the gas station at New Durham and Durham Avenue at first.

  • WOW

    That was awesome and great editing too Sir! Thanks for sharing ans stuff.

  • wow that really hard for me to watch

  • the best part is the dramatic kettledrum sound and the text "we were watching Arsenio"

  • this was the creepiest thing next to 9-11 id ever seen...i was coming down thru clark on raritan road around midnight.... and i saw flames shooting up , thought it was a local house fire or something.... didnt know it was 10 miles away,and the ground was shaking and there was this rumbling noise.... i thought we got nuked for sure hehee..

  • i remember watching this fire when i was like 5 years old from my front yard...i lived in the apartment complex down the road...my close friend lived there when this happend...it was insane... all the paint on the cars in the area bubbled up...and the apartments were destroyed...you can still see all the trees that are charred and burned...its like a dead area behind Durham Woods..the flames were unreal as you can see in the video but you could honestly feel the heat radiating from that far away

  • DAMN! looks like the sun gave way.

  • I remember this event, I was actually down the street at Edison Job corps when this happened. I couldn't see much from were I was, but I saw the night sky lite up. The noise from the fire trucks etc..kept me awoke most of the night.

  • It looks like people trying to escape a war

  • My God, thats a monsterwall of fire there :S

    I would crap the entire town if I was there!!!

    Awfull :O