All occupants and pets made it safely out, but a firefighter did receive second degree burns.
He was treated and is now back on duty.

Officials say the fire appears to have started in a bedroom, but the exact cause is still under investigation.
The Red Cross is helping the displaced residents.

It was not immediately clear what caused the 36-inch-diameter Oasis pipeline owned and operated by Dallas-based Energy Transfer Partners LP to rupture at about 7:45 a.m. The fire was out

The rupture occurred near a compressor station that pressurizes the gas line, said Ramona Nye, a spokeswoman for the Texas Railroad Commission, which regulates pipeline safety. Both ends of the ruptured segment were blocked off and a “controlled burn” was under way to eliminate the remaining gas, she said.

Nye said the commission had dispatched an inspector to the scene and would complete a report in 45 days. Asked about the company’s track record, Nye said, “They have a good record and we haven’t had any violations issued against them in the last five years on this Oasis line.”

Deputy Chief David Creed with the Luling Police Department said no injuries have been reported and no one in the area has been evacuated. Fire officials in Lockhart said the explosion was felt there.

The explosion occurred about three miles east of Prairie Lea School, but students are still in school, officials said. The Prairie Lea school district has a collection of buildings housing about 250 students in all grade levels, but only a few faculty members were there at the time of explosion.

“At this time, the only effect this has is we’ve asked the students and teachers to stay in classrooms,” said Darren Kesselus, director of curriculum at the district.

A few parents have already picked up their children, Kesselus said, but he said authorities have told the district that students were safer in the school than on the road because of concerns about transformers located along the highway. One class in the vicinity of a transformer has been moved to another classroom, Kesselus said.

Because gas has been turned off in the area, schools will serve cold sandwiches instead of a hot lunch, which Kesselus said the district always has available as a backup.

Kesselus said the district superintendent is at the explosion site and is keeping in contact with administrators at the school in case anything changes.

“We are staying vigilant,” he said.

Texas Department of Public Safety officials said an area several miles wide had been cordoned off around the explosion site, and firefighters from Luling, Lockhart and other departments were on the scene. The officials asked not to be quoted by name because they were not authorized to speak to reporters.

The fire had burned out by noon, officials said, but at midmorning the flames were still reported shooting skyward at the scene, and a large cloud of smoke remained visible miles away.

In Austin, a DPS spokesperson acknowledged that state troopers were assisting at the scene, but directed inquiries about details of the explosion to the Caldwell County sheriff’s office, where phones lines rang busy.

Vicki Granado, a spokeswoman for Energy Transfer Partners, said the company operates nearly 14,000 miles of natural gas pipelines in Texas, as well as additional pipelines outside the state. The Oasis line conveys natural gas from West Texas to Katy, near Houston, where the line connects with other pipelines, she said.

“No. 1, having a first-responder vehicle broken into in first place is rare but to have that many in a week is extremely rare,” Senior Cpl. Kevin Janse said.

Thieves have taken four handheld radios programmed with emergency frequencies. Unlike police and fire scanners, the radios have the capability to make calls.

“There’s some shenanigans going on,” Dallas firefighter Stanley Haggerty said.

Dallas first responders are being warned about the potential for pranks.

“Not only could they be listening to us communicate back and forth between officers, but they could get on there and send us to calls — false calls — (and) divert us from other calls,” Janse said.

Dallas fire stations, which are long accustomed to leaving their doors open and engines running, are changing their ways.

“It’s just like at home you can’t leave your garage open,” Haggerty said. “Somebody might steal something, so that’s just unfortunate.”

Firefighters said the new measures will likely add to their response time, but they said they can’t risk having any more radios fall into the wrong hands.

“It’s the price you pay in these times,” Haggerty said.

Firefighters at the Greenville station, which has had its fire engine and ambulance burglarized, closed their garage doors Tuesday night. Firefighters said it was very hot inside their garage, but they are willing to sweat for safety’s sake.

Clay Hodges, the general manager of Cash Special Utility District, said all the district’s hydrants, including those in the Alexander Ranch subdivision where the home burned several weeks ago, have had their water turned off since just after 9/11.

“These hydrants need to be cut off in a way to prevent vandalism or any kind of terrorist activity, including something in the water lines,” he said.

A trade association spokesman said shutting hydrants down in rural systems is common. Private systems do not have to maintain hydrants for fire protection.

Cash Water officials said they sent letters to area fire departments to remind them they’ll have to turn the hydrants on, and Mr. Hodges said firefighters should have known the valves could be turned back on with a special tool.

“All our fire departments, at least the local ones I know, were notified of that,” he said.

But when firefighters from around Rockwall County responded to the Alexander Ranch fire, none of them had the tool. By the time someone brought one, it was too late.

Rick King of the Alexander Ranch Property Owners Association said it is working to get the tools in the hands of homeowners as an extra precaution.

Initially, firefighters entered the building, but they were quickly called out as it became engulfed in flames.

Killeen Fire Chief Jerry Gardner said officials were worried the building, which contained live ammunition, would collapse, so they began fighting the flames from outside and above.

At 11:15 p.m., aerial trucks from Killeen, Fort Hood and Harker Heights were still fighting to contain the flames and prevent the building from collapsing on nearby structures, including a Shell gas station next door. Electricity was shut off in the area.

Hundreds of people gathered in the Wendy’s parking lot and at Eisenhower National Bank to watch firefighters try to contain the blaze. Officials diverted all Fort Hood Street traffic from Central Texas Expressway to the Gold’s Gym parking lot while firefighters worked.

The cause of the fire is unknown.

Gardner said initial reports showed Action Pawn’s security alarm had been triggered shortly before firefighters arrived on scene; however, he said the fire could have triggered the alarm.

Gardner expected the fire department to remain on site until mid-morning to keep a watch on any hot spots.

Once the fire is out completely, an investigator will enter the building and attempt to determine a cause as well as account for all the ammunition in the building, he said.

That may be a difficult task, according to Ron Kelly, the gun department manager at Action Pawn. He said the Fort Hood Street store is among the top five largest pawn shops in Texas. “Whatever was left of the gun department is gone,” he said.

Authorities say a woman jumped from the second floor of the fourplex suffering minor injuries.

Five adults and five children were inside at the time. Officials say the two upper units suffered fire damage, while the two low units received water damage.

The cause of the blaze is under investigation.

“Around 6 p.m. my wife and I were getting ready to eat, we were going to serve dinner from the stove, when we heard a clap of lightning,” Fred Parsons said. “We lost the fan and light on the microwave and I went to check the breaker and heard the smoke detectors going off. I checked the attic door and saw the smoke and called 9-1-1.”

The Parsons had enough time to gather their keys, cellphones and wallets before heading outside to await the emergency crews’ arrival. Four Port Arthur Fire Department ladder trucks as well as the department’s HazMat truck and police department crews responded to the call.

“My wife and I are safe and we’ve got insurance, but I hate to see it go,” he said as fire fighters worked to extinguish the flames billowing from the roof of the home in the 3800 block of Cobblestone Lane.

Instead of worrying about his personal belongings, Fred Parsons said he hoped that none of the fire fighters got hurt while fighting the blaze.

However, one fireman had to be escorted from the house and was treated for heat exhaustion by medic crews on hand. He was later cleared to continue putting out the fire.

“They are doing the best they can,” Fred Parsons said of the fireman.

Mary Jane Parsons’ eyes filled with tears as she watched the flames tear from the left side of the house - above the kitchen - to the right side above the bedrooms. Before fire fighters could extinguish the flames, the fire tore open the roof, exposing beams, sheetrock and creating holes throughout the entire roof.

“There goes my sewing,” Mary Jane Parson said as a burst of flames lept through a section of the upstairs. “I had just brought home a bunch of things from my mothers - quilts and things I was going to patch together.”

Fred Parsons said the upstairs also housed still and video cameras and several file cabinets of family photos. Yet, he still kept a positive attitude as smoke blew across the street from his home and clouded his view.

“We are blessed. I look here and I’ve got good health, a good job and we can reform our life from here,” he said.

Neighbors offered the couple bottles of water and lawnchairs and crowds gathered to watch crews fight the flame. Several neighbors offered a place for the couple to stay for the night.

Young was the only resident of the apartment, according to a witness. The fire department was alerted to the fire just before 8 a.m.

The four unit apartment complex is owned by Carolyn King, according to her son, who was at the scene.

Torrid Jones first discovered the smoke when the apartment’s breaker box switched off as she was leaving for work.

“It flips all the time, so I walked out and said we’ll just flip it back when we get home. We don’t need the lights anyway while we’re not at home. All of a sudden all you could see was smoke. It wasn’t two minutes later.”

Flames appeared with Taneisha Tutt inside.

She said, ” I was asleep. I was asleep when my cousin came.”

Jones recalled, ” I ran to this window and beat on the window and called her and she couldn’t get it up and we finally got it up and I pulled her out of the window.”

The emotion was too much. She began to weep. A cat named Miracle was rescued. Another is missing.

Firefighters dealt with the thick smoke. They assessed the situation to make sure no one else was in danger. Joseph Ramirez with the Nacogdoches Fire Department described the damage, “Had slight extension in the next apartment. This happens to be a four unit apartment.”

After the smoke cleared the tenant could see the loss was significant, but the fire didn’t spread to other units. Thankfully, a fire wall had been installed at time of construction. Firefighters say if it hadn’t been there, the entire complex would have gone up in flames.

Investigators suspect the fire is electrical in nature. Petrice Young is almost certain of it. She knows what she had plugged into one extension cord.

She admitted, “Maybe, like three or four. TV, DVD, computer.” A common practice that fire investigators will certainly consider as the probable cause.

According to the Consumer Product Safety Commission, about 3,300 residential fires originate in extension cords each year, killing 50 people and injuring about 270 others. The most frequent causes of such fires are short circuits and overloading of extension cords.