Toddler Dies from Burns in Gas Explosion at Kansas City, Missouri, Home

By Mary Mitchell

Published on September 13, 2006

Neighbors who pulled Shalena and her mother, 27-year-old LaTasha Douglas, from their Kansas City, Missouri, home described the two as being on fire following the blast, which blew out an exterior wall of the house at about 10:30 that night. Shalena was flown to the Cincinnati Shriners Hospital for Children, to no avail.

Family members said that LaTasha Douglas described smelling natural gas on the evening of the explosion, and that she planned to call the gas company the next day. They also stated that Ms. Douglas had called about a gas smell in the home weeks before the blast. A Missouri Gas Energy spokesperson said that after the gas fire was extinguished, the source of the gas leak could not be found.

Ms. Douglas began a first round of surgeries at the University of Kansas hospital two days after the explosion. She had been working as a nurses’ aide in local nursing homes. The Kansas City fire department and Missouri Gas Energy are continuing to investigate the explosion.

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