'I'm lighting a cigarette coming down the steps,' Clay Metzger recalled. 'And that's the last thing I remember.'
"I'm lighting a cigarette coming down the steps," Clay Metzger recalled. "And that's the last thing I remember."
There was a vague, dreamlike sensation of flying. Then He landed in the yard across the street, badly burned. Neighbors said he cried out for a fire hose.
Metzger remembers looking back at the house, thinking in his daze that everything looked fine. It was not.
Debris was strewn down the block. People were out in the street wondering what had happened. Police smelled gas and quickly pushed everyone back as they set up a safe perimeter.
Sunday is one year since an explosion rocked the Phillipsburg neighborhood. And there still has been no official explanation why.
Facts and rumors
Here is what we know: Late in the afternoon on June 4, 2016, the duplex at 74-76 Filmore Street was destroyed. Several residents were displaced and two were hurt, Metzger most seriously with burns over half his body. Investigators determined the blast originated in his second-floor apartment at 76 Filmore, and that Metzger was key to understanding what happened.
After that, the rumor mill takes over -- maybe it was a gas leak, a meth lab, a botched suicide attempt or ... .
To date, authorities have not officially confirmed a cause. The Warren County Prosecutor's Office, which is heading the investigation, could not offer comment for this story. Local and county fire officials deferred to the prosecutor, saying that if a determination has been made, they are not aware of it.
A year after the homes at 74-76 Filmore Street in Phillipsburg exploded, a narrow empty lot remains but does not look particularly out of place in the neighborhood. (Steve Novak | For lehighvalleylive.com) "It's unfortunate that the information hasn't gotten out there," Phillipsburg fire Chief Rich Hay said. "I'm a firm believer that we need to know what happened, and we don't."
A spokesman for Elizabethtown Gas reaffirmed a company statement from months ago, saying that both the service line to the house and the gas meter were functioning properly.
But could it have ignited inside the building? Mayor Stephen Ellis in October became the first -- and so far only -- official to say gas was the source, that a meter to a shut-off stove supposedly spiked the day of the blast.
Metzger, in his first public comments since the explosion, said that is what happened.
Trying to remember
The memories don't come easily, and some not at all. Metzger has trouble finding words to complete his sentences, or remembering names. He was sure the explosion must have happened in the morning, though he knows now that it was really about 5 p.m. -- the rest of the day is a blank.
"I'm sure I hit my head a few times" in the blast, he said. "How do you think about things you can't remember or don't know? ... Putting that together is kinda -- I don't know."
He does remember his gas stove with the broken knobs. For seven months, he said, he cooked by switching the wall valve on and off. Neighbors said he had often complained about that stove.
Could the attachment have been bad? Or was it not shut off all the way? Or did his dog, Lucky, knock it loose while tearing around the house the day before? Metzger said he can't be sure.
But he does remember getting Lucky ready for a walk, heading to the stairs and lighting the cigarette.
"As far as I know, it had to have been that oven," he said. "It couldn't have happened any other way."
That half of the property was owned until last fall by Hunterdon Rentals LLC, based in Clinton, according to property records. A phone number for a representative could not be found. (The now-empty lot is currently held by the Federal National Mortgage Association, aka Fannie Mae; a spokesman said they are actively trying to sell the property.)
Metzger said that while others have urged him, he is not seriously considering a lawsuit. "People do that too much today," he said. "I hate money. I think it ruins where we are supposed to be as a culture, a civilization."
In lieu of litigation, he conceded that maybe he shouldn't say anything.
But, he concluded, "I don't feel like I have anything to hide."
One year later
Thursday was a warm, sunny June afternoon, much like the one a year ago. Johana Hardenber and Roni Fox were watching their kids playing "car wash" with a hose and squirt pumps on the sidewalk across from the lot that was 74-76 Filmore.
They probably would have been out there that day last year if it hadn't been for a last-minute trip to Dorney Park, Hardenber said.
"Our kids have all been in that house, on that porch hanging out," she said.
Charlotte Fox, left, and Teresa Edwards play on Filmore Street in Phillipsburg, nearly across from the now-empty lot where a house exploded a year earlier. (Steve Novak | For lehighvalleylive.com) Others in the neighborhood recalled the day and its aftermath. First there was the terror and confusion: Almost everyone had pictures knocked off the walls, windows blown out or debris in the yard.
It was Bonnie Wismer's lawn in which Metzger landed. She said she saw him light the cigarette that set it off, then heard him scream for a hose after realizing he'd been burned.
"My husband went flying off his chair onto the floor," she said. "And I sat there and watched the whole thing happen."
The days after were surreal. There was no traffic. Hardenber and Fox described the kids taking advantage of the closed-off street and playing kickball, the rubble of the destroyed house providing an eerie backdrop to the game. Town police would frequent the area, escorting the kids around and stopping to play basketball with them.
"They were strong. This united us," Hardenber said.
Aside from the shock, the sense of unity seemed to be the strongest memory. There were charity drives for the affected residents and efforts to build a sense of normalcy.
One neighbor, Marlo Brown, dedicated herself to finding Lucky. She said she saw movement in the rubble the next day, which turned out to be the dog -- her leash still on. Lucky and Metzger were reunited after he was released from the hospital in July.
Lucky the dog survives P'burg blast
One year out, there seemed to be no sense of fear on the block. Just a sense of community.
Jessica Mravlag moved in down the street about a month ago with her husband and two kids. She was living elsewhere in Phillipsburg during the explosion, but said now she has no concerns, just an idle curiosity.
"I hope everybody's back on their feet," she said as her son played on the front porch.
Metzger still lives in Phillipsburg. Filmore Avenue residents say the building's other occupants still do, too.
Every so often, Metzger passes by the site of his former apartment. Lucky still recognizes it.
"I stop, I hit my knees," he said. "My dog gets excited. ... She'll whine and cry."
Metzger said he is in occasional contact with his former neighbors. One has a 3-year-old daughter, he said, who still goes to bed crying and wondering if her house will blow up.
Steve Novak may be reached at snovak@lehighvalleylive.com. Follow him on Twitter @type2supernovak and Facebook. Find lehighvalleylive.com on Facebook.