Updated March 13, 2014 5:00 a.m. ET
NEW YORK—At least six people were killed and more than 60 were injured in an apparent natural-gas explosion that leveled two residential buildings and severely damaged a third Wednesday morning in Manhattan, officials said.
Early Thursday, the Associated Press said an adult male was pulled from the rubble just after midnight Wednesday, a woman was found about 2:50 a.m. Thursday and a man was discovered about a half hour later.
The 9:31 a.m. blast rocked the East Harlem neighborhood, shattering windows, throwing neighbors from their beds and sending people fleeing down the block in a cloud of smoke and debris.
The century-old, five-story brick structures housed a total of 15 apartments, a church and a piano store in a neighborhood favored by immigrants. The blast also caused significant damage to a neighboring four-story building. More than 100 residents were staying in a nearby American Red Cross shelter.
Emergency workers were searching for victims in parts of the rubble, but sections remained inaccessible because of a sinkhole created by a water-main break, likely caused by the explosion, city officials said.
"This is a tragedy of the worst kind," Mayor Bill de Blasio said.
Sgt. Griselde Camacho, a public safety officer at Hunter College, died in Wednesday's East Harlem explosion Hunter College
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A blast and fire rocked a building in New York's East Harlem, with multiple injuries likely and debris apparently raining down on adjacent Metro-North train tracks. Pervaiz Shallwani reports on the News Hub. Photo: AP.
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Among the dead were Carmen Tanco, 67 years old, according to her family and pastor, and Griselde Camacho, a 44-year-old security guard at Hunter College in Manhattan, the school said. Police identified a third fatal victim as Rosaura Hernandez-Barrios, 21, according to AP. Several children were reported to be among the injured.
The blast temporarily shut down a nearby commuter-rail line leading to Grand Central Terminal that is a main artery between the city and its northern suburbs.
A National Transportation Safety Board team arrived at the blast site Wednesday, and the U.S. Department of Transportation was sending investigators. The NTSB investigates pipeline incidents as part of the nation's broad transportation system.
One of the buildings is owned by Kaoru Muramatsu
Demler, while the second is owned by Spanish Christian Church Inc., city property records indicate. Ms. Demler and church officials couldn't be reached Wednesday.
Authorities said preliminary evidence pointed to a natural gas explosion. At 9:13 a.m., utility Consolidated Edison Inc., which supplies gas and electric service, received a report of a gas odor from a resident of a neighboring building, who indicated the smell may have been coming from outside, said the utility's chief executive, John McAvoy. Two ConEd crews arrived shortly after the explosion, he said.
The New York State Public Service Commission, which regulates ConEd and other utilities, said it had dispatched two gas-safety inspectors to the site to look for signs that a gas leak caused the explosion.
New York City gets natural gas from two major utilities: ConEd and National Grid PLC. They manage among the oldest gas-distribution networks in the country, according to the Center for an Urban Future, a New York City-based think tank.
The Park Avenue block is served by a gas main that runs north and south and is 8 inches in diameter. About 70 feet of the approximately 150 feet of gas main in the block is made of 2011-vintage plastic, while the rest is a cast-iron pipe from 1887, ConEd said. There were no known problems with the pipe, authorities said.
"We don't know if the main is leaking," said Edward C. Foppiano, ConEd's senior vice president of gas operations. "And we don't know where it's leaking, if it is leaking. All that will be determined."
In 2013, eight people died and 39 were injured in 21 fires, explosions or other accidents involving pipelines delivering natural gas to neighborhoods, according to the U.S. Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration. An additional 270 people have died from such incidents since 1994.
The cause of half of last year's accidents remains unknown, the agency said. The other half were triggered by construction digging that accidentally broke through a gas line or by motor-vehicle damage.
On Wednesday, nearby residents said they felt the blast and emerged to find an apocalyptic scene: car windows blown out, a city bus being evacuated, people splayed on the ground, injured and bleeding. Some at first feared it had been a terrorist attack, with the target possibly being the Metro-North Railroad tracks nearby.
One of the injured, Luis Rivera, 52, was sleeping in his first-floor apartment in a building next door to the collapsed buildings. He was thrown from his bed as objects fell around him, including a television.
"I thought it was an earthquake," he said. "Everything, it fell on top of my bed."
Mr. Rivera was discharged from the hospital Wednesday afternoon. He said he was still feeling pain in his back and neck.
Dozens of people flocked to the Red Cross shelter to look for missing family members.
Montserrat Acevedo, 24, said she had checked four hospitals in search of her brother-in-law, Jordy Salas, a 22-year-old student who she believed had been at home that morning in one of the buildings that collapsed. The day had been "very, very stressful," she said.
—Ben Rubin, Sean Gardiner, Yoni Bashan, Josh Dawsey, Josh Barbanel, Martin Baruch, Michael Hickins, Alison Fox, and Mara Gay contributed to this article.
Write to Pervaiz Shallwani at Pervaiz.Shallwani@wsj.com
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