A school bus drives by the remains of the Flower Branch Apartments in Silver Spring, Md., soon after the explosion and fire that killed seven there in August 2016. The regulator and vent were owned and operated by Washington Gas and were the utility’s responsibility to maintain, NTSB investigator Rachael Gunaratnam said during an agency board meeting. Stuffed toys attached to the fence at the sitet of the explosion at the Flower Branch Apartment complex, where five adults and two children died in August 2016. The agency also recommended revising national protocols to direct emergency dispatchers to notify the gas company directly when any report about gas odor is received. “We want to make sure that what happened at Flower Branch doesn’t happen again,” she said.

Source: Washington Post April 23, 2019 16:06 UTC