Gas tank explodes at Mass. salvage yard, rockets into air, crashes through home’s solar panels

Dumped gas tank explodes, flies into Mass. home

BRIDGEWATER, Mass. — A 50-pound gas tank dumped in a Massachusetts salvage yard has exploded and rocketed into the air before crashing through solar panels and the roof of a nearby home and landing in a bedroom.

Fire department Deputy Chief Thomas Levy says two people were at the home in Bridgewater, a town of about 25,000 residents just south of Boston. He says no one was injured when the cylinder of compressed natural gas crashed into the house Monday.

Levy tells the Boston Globe newspaper firefighters at first treated the tank as if it were a bomb because they weren’t sure if it had come “from an aircraft or somewhere else.”

Levy says it appears someone wanting to get rid of the tank took it into the salvage yard hidden among other debris.

Investigators are trying to identify the culprit.