By Josh Katzenstein
The Detroit News
Detroit — LaNeesha McCants peeked through the windows of her east-side home at 1:15 a.m. Wednesday to see what was upsetting her dog, Mama, and noticed a man rummaging around the house next door.
A little while later, she returned to her bedroom to fall back asleep. Then, boom.
Two dozen firefighters spent more than an hour battling a suspected arson on the 9000 block of Sanilac Street, near Morang Drive and Interstate 94, about 2 a.m. Wednesday.
“I was going crazy,” McCants said about having the house next door explode.
She ran to check on her 16-year-old daughter. “I was like, ‘This house is in my driveway.’”
Detroit Fire Capt. Pat McNulty said preliminary tests show someone doused the house in gasoline.
“It had nothing to do with natural gas. This was all about an explosion caused by gasoline vapors,” McNulty said. “The two are similar, but they’re not alike.”
Glass and other debris blew onto Sanilac Street and Morang Drive. Only a small portion of the house was standing around 8 a.m. Wednesday with most of the house - besides some red bricks — completely charred.
Cadaver dogs searched the burned-out house and found no bodies, and McNulty said there were no injuries.
McCants, 33, had three windows and a side glass door smashed from the explosion.
Two men had been living in the house for about three months, but McCants said she saw them moving furniture into a truck Tuesday.
“You’ve got to laugh at it because if I get sad, I’ll go crazy. It scared the life out of me. The first thing I thought was to get my daughter,” she said.
McCants’ daughter Elexius was also in the house with their American pit bull. McCants’ 5-year-old daughter, Elayna Drake, was staying with an aunt.
Police, fire and utility crews all arrived at the scene within about 15 minutes of the blast, McCants said.
DTE Energy spokesman John Austerberry said the house had an illegal gas setup, but it’s unclear if the occupants were stealing gas.
The Detroit Fire Department is offering a reward of up to $5,000 for any information that leads to an arrest or conviction in the incident. Anyone with information about the fire can call the department’s arson unit at (313) 596-2940.
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