WFMJ.com News weather sports for Youngstown-Warren OhioMcDonald thankful 25 years after gas fires

McDonald thankful 25 years after gas fires

MCDONALD, Ohio - Retired McDonald firefighter Rich Harvey always has a quiet moment at noon on Thanksgiving Day.

"We celebrate life today," said Harvey.

It was noon on Thanksgiving 25 years ago when he and two other firefighters responded to a kitchen fire in the village.

"I'm standing there operating the truck and all these people come running at me from everywhere," Harvey remembered. "They said, you've got to come, this house is on fire down there!"

House fires began popping up in kitchens all over McDonald.

"Somebody told us their turkey blew out of the oven!" Harvey recalled. "It came flying out of there. So we're going house to house and we get the magnitude that something's terribly wrong."

A gas line regulator malfunctioned surging gas through the lines into homes throughout the village. Mutual aid rushed in from all over to help fight the fires.

"We went from fire to fire to fire all day long," remembered Harvey. "Twenty-six. All over town. Gas pouring out everywhere."

Once the gas was turned off and the smoke cleared, emergency workers realized one thing.

"First question out of everybody's mouth when we came back here, how many injured and how many dead do we have reported?" Harvey recalled. "He said, 'We have none.' The smiles, the relief, we said, it's a miracle."

Not a single person was killed or seriously injured in the gas surge fires, though 50 homes and one business were damaged.

"As the night wound down, the chief came and got me and told me my brother's house was gutted, we never got there," Harvey remembered with emotion.

Every year since the 1986, Harvey and other residents stop to remember for what was avoided that day.

"At noon for the last 24 years wherever we're at we'll stop and give thanks," said Harvey. "We came away with no deaths, we celebrate life today at noon."