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Friday, December 26, 2008

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Posted: 26 Dec 2008 12:16 AM CST

SAN DIEGO -- Border Patrol agents searching an underground drainage channel in the Tijuana River Valley Wednesday found a badly injured man who may have been left for dead by a group of fellow illegal immigrants.

The federal personnel decided to walk through the runoff channel just north of the U.S.-Mexico line after detaining six suspected undocumented immigrants in the area shortly before dawn, authorities said.

Reaching a spot near the bottom of a 30-foot-deep vertical drainage pipe around noon, they found the 50-year-old injured man, who was slipping in and out of consciousness, Border Patrol Agent Jerry Conlin said.

The federal agency notified the San Diego Fire-Rescue Department, which sent in crews to rescue the man.

Firefighters removed a grating covering the shaft, and then lowered several crew members into the culvert, SDFRD spokesman Maurice Luque said.

The personnel evaluated the man and loaded him onto a stretcher. Crews then hoisted him to the surface and put him in an ambulance, which took him to a waiting emergency-services helicopter.

The aircraft flew the man to UCSD Medical Center in Hillcrest for treatment of apparently extensive injuries, according to Luque.

It was unclear how the man had gotten hurt, the spokesman said.

The agents who found him only did so because they "took it upon themselves" to search the runoff channel, Conlin said.

"It's not something they would normally do," he said.

Authorities suspect that the injured man had been left behind by the suspected illegal immigrants arrested earlier in the day, according to Conlin.

Source: News10 - Link

1 dead, 6 injured - Home explosion - Gas leak

Posted: 26 Dec 2008 12:05 AM CST

Man Dies From Injuries In Rancho Cordova Explosion
Five Others Injured In the Massive Blast
1 dead, 4 People In Critical Condition

HOME EXPLODES IN RANCHO CORDOVA

At least six people were injured, including a Sac Metro firefighter that was taken to Mercy San Juan Medical Center after suffering from smoke inhalation and has been released., when a home exploded in a Sacramento suburb, creating a fireball witnesses said climbed four stories high.

At least six people were hospitalized when a home exploded in a Sacramento suburb, and a grandfather has died of his injuries.

Wilbert "Bill" Paana, who officials say was in his early 70s, died from injuries sustained in the massive blast. Earlier reports said he suffered a severe abdominal wound.

Paana and two of his family members were transported to the University of California, Davis medical complex in critical condition after the explosion, according to hospital spokeswoman Phyllis Brown. The other two family members injured in the blast have been identified as Kim Dickson, a woman in her mid-40s, and 17-year-old Sunny Dickson.

Charred remnants were all that remained of the house near on Paiute Way, which sat at the end of a cul-de-sac beside a busy highway. Debris littered the street after house was destroyed by a fireball witnesses said climbed four stories high.

Homes on either side of the leveled home also were damaged.

Sacramento Metropolitan Fire District spokesman Christian Pebbles said officials believe the explosion was caused by a natural gas leak, prompting them to briefly evacuate 30 to 40 nearby homes.

"One house is completely destroyed, just devastated. Both the other ones have major, major damage," Pebbles said.

John Turner, who lives in a duplex about two blocks from the leveled home, said he heard "a big boom" shortly after 1:30 p.m.

"It sounded like something had fallen on my roof," he said in a telephone interview. "I saw flames about as high as the house next door ... the smoke was billowing from that area."

Turner said he saw two PG&E trucks near the explosion site when he walked out of his house.

Neighbors told CBS station KOVR-TV in Sacramento that they had reported the gas leak to PG&E Tuesday night, but spokesman Brian Swanson said they had not confirmed that anyone had called before Wednesday morning, when crews began investigating the leak.

Pacific Gas & Electric Co. crews had been called to the street earlier in the day after someone reported smelling gas and were on scene when the home exploded.

A utility worker who was standing in the street at the time of the blast was injured and hospitalized with slight burns to the hand and cuts to the head, Swanson said.

Another utility worker had been in the neighborhood all morning investigating the report of a natural gas smell, he said. She was replaced in the afternoon by the employee who was injured.

A firefighter was taken to Mercy San Juan Medical Center after suffering from smoke inhalation and has been released.

Sources: CBS2 - Link,
CBS13- Link
More photos: at CBS 2 - Link