As a result of a gas explosion in a residential building in the city of Efremov, Tula region, 8 people were killed, Interfax reports . Telegram channel "112" writes that on February 8, the bodies of a woman and a child were removed from the rubble. Rescuers do not rule out that there may still be people under the rubble.
Tula News Service (TSN) reports 7 dead. Her source also confirms the death of the child. According to the publication, specialists from the Research Institute for Civil Defense and Emergencies of the Russian Emergencies Ministry will examine the building and write a conclusion on its suitability for further use.
The explosion, as a result of which one of the entrances of the house collapsed, occurred on February 7 on Khimikov Street. Four casualties were initially reported . In total, 234 people lived in the house. Some of the residents are in temporary accommodation. A criminal case has been initiated under Part 3 of Art. 238 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (the provision of services that do not meet safety requirements, resulting in the death of a person by negligence).
In 2022, more than 30 household gas explosions occurred in residential buildings in Russia. In December last year, a gas explosion in Nizhnevartovsk killed 10 people. As Konstantin Krokhin, a member of the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Russia, an expert in the field of housing and communal services, told the BBC, the reasons for such incidents should be sought in the depreciation of the infrastructure and poor control over its work. “Legislatively, the responsibility for the proper maintenance of gas household appliances is assigned to the owners. It turns out that the powers to control the state of gas appliances have been transferred to those persons who actually need to be controlled, ”Krokhin explained.
In 2018, the State Duma adopted in the first reading a bill according to which management companies, and not homeowners, should be responsible for the maintenance of gas equipment. The second reading, however, has not yet taken place. In January 2023, Sergei Pakhomov, head of the State Duma Committee on Construction and Housing and Public Utilities, announced that the document was ready for the second reading.