Staff file photo / Ed Runyan This debris field was all that was left after an Oct. 5 house explosion on Huxley Road in Ellsworth that killed four people.

ELLSWORTH — The State Fire Marshal’s Office has ruled the cause of the Oct. 5 explosion that killed Jeff and JoAnn Kocanyar, their daughter and son-in-law at a home on Huxley Road “undetermined,” but said a propane leak was the “most probable cause.”

The office released its report Friday, providing a detailed account of the investigation, which delved into the possible connection between the work done the previous day to replace wood siding on the house and the 7:19 a.m. blast.

The blast killed Jeff, 69, and JoAnn, 67, their daughter, Julie Lubic, 33, and her husband, Adam Lubic, 33, who were visiting from Chicago.

The home’s furnace was fueled by a 500-gallon propane tank located behind the detached garage. The propane tank and detached garage survived the explosion, but there was little left of the house — only a debris field in every direction around the foundation.

The findings noted several possible “ignition sources” for the explosion, including the furnace, a hot water tank, refrigerator or “source unknown,” the report states. None of the four people in the home smoked or “would have been smoking in the residence at the time of the explosion,” family members said.

The explosion caused unimaginable damage, sending pieces of the home over a row of tall arborvitae trees across the street. The debris also broke or damaged most of the windows on the front of a neighbor’s house about 400 feet away on the other side of the street. The neighbor, Tracey Beardsley, told The Vindicator the explosion “blew me right out of the chair.”

Kala Christy, a next-door neighbor, who was close with the Kocanyars, told investigators that the day before the explosion, she talked to JoAnn Kocanyar, who told her that Jeff had gone to the store that day to buy parts because the workers removing the wood siding from the exterior of the Kocanyars’ house “were banging on the house so hard that they broke a water line somewhere, and the basement was flooding.”

WORK CREW

The workers were removing wood siding on the house and were hired to replace it with vinyl siding. The 44-page investigative report contained a section written by investigator Kurt Wright in which he reported that he spoke with representatives of the company at their Youngstown area offices.

One representative told Wright he received a text message and photos at 4:26 p.m. Oct. 4 from JoAnne stating that the workers “had accidentally broken a water pipe within the basement of the residence.” Kocanyar shared seven photographs of the broken pipe, which “was utilized for an outdoor water spigot on the outside of the residence,” the report states.

JoAnne indicated that Jeff “was going to the hardware store to purchase the materials to fix the pipe and that she was just bringing it to (the company’s) attention,” the report states.

The company’s project manager explained that crews typically work until 5 p.m. But with the permission of the owners, they continued to work until 7 p.m. the night before the explosion. The company provided photos it took of the house during the estimate phase of the project before it began, apparently to show investigators how the house looked before the explosion.

Investigator Donald Illig went to the home the day of the explosion. He described checking the propane tank and a line that led from the tank to where it entered the home at the home’s northeast corner, which is the back, left corner. The property is about 7 miles southwest of the Canfield Fairgrounds.

The line “ended a short distance into the basement,” Illig’s report states. The conclusions part of the report written by investigator Todd Stitt states that among the areas where firefighters saw fire when they arrived after the explosion was the northeast corner of the basement where the copper tubing that carried propane from the propane tank entered the home.

Firefighters also said they observed fire on the south side of the home near the chimney, east side by the wooden patio, and “the north side area had debris burning. An area of origin could not be determined due to the lack of identifiable burn patterns,” the report states.

An investigator found the regulator to the propane line, which controls the flow of gas, in the debris on the east side of the home. It was photographed and retained for safekeeping, the report states.

A “synopsis” of the incident in the investigative materials indicated that neighbors reported that the construction crew had been placing insulation and siding on the garage and rear of the residence the day before the explosion. Beardsley told investigators the construction crew worked “towards the back of the house” the day before the explosion.

A company representative said the workers initially worked at the north end of the house (left side) where the attached garage was located.

Next they moved to the rear of the house where they used “pump jacks,” the report states. One jack was installed at the northeast corner of the home and the second one was along the attached deck on the rear of the home.

Pump jacks are a “uniquely designed scaffold, consisting of a platform supported by moveable brackets on vertical poles,” according to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration website.

PROPANE COMPANY

Two representatives of the Salem propane company that serviced the home arrived at the explosion site several hours after it happened. A state fire marshal’s investigator requested that the copper line be pressure tested, but a decision was made not to test it at that time.

One of the two company representatives “locked out the propane valve on the 500-gallon tank and secured it,” and an investigator “sealed the lid over the valve with an evidence tag,” the report states.

A document provided by the propane company indicated that the Kocanyars had last gotten a delivery of propane from the company March 18, 2024.

WATERLINE

Investigators reported that a family member found Adam Lubic’s cell phone in the explosion debris and found photos on it of the damaged waterline in the basement. The family member emailed nine photos from the phone, “eight of which depicted the damaged waterline in the northeast corner of the basement,” the report states. “The ninth photo documented the location of the waterline,” the document noted.

A second propane line was found in the debris that appeared to run lengthwise along the back of the home that reportedly supplied a gas fireplace on the extreme south side of the home. Family members told investigators the fireplace was “never used,” the report states.

The furnace, electric hot water tank and electric washer and dryer were located in the northwest corner of the basement, the report states.

Julie and Adam Lubic, who lived in Chicago, were visiting for the weekend, family members told investigators. “It was their one-year anniversary, having gotten married in October 2023,” the report stated. The Kocanyars were early risers and would have probably been awake at the time of the explosion, family members said. Adam also was an early riser, but not his wife, the report states.

The conclusion section of the report written by Stitt states that firefighters reported seeing fire coming from the copper tubing located in the northeast corner of the basement. The tubing was “from the 500-gallon propane tank,” it stated.

The home was built in 1989. Its “entire roof system and exterior walls collapsed and / or were blown outward in all directions,” the report states.

An investigator with the Mahoning County Coroner’s Office reported to investigators that the body of Adam Lubic, the only one of the four victims who was still alive at the scene and was transported to the hospital before he died, was “pink, which is an indication of (carbon monoxide) poisoning.”

But his autopsy results indicated that he did not test positive for carbon monoxide poisoning, according to the documents released by the state fire marshal.

The state fire marshal’s office was present for an “inspection” Dec. 6 at the explosion site. Also attending were lawyers representing the Kocanyar and Lubic families and lawyers representing the construction and propane companies, according to an “attendance sheet” listing about 25 people.

FIREFIGHTER

Jared Myers of Salem, a Damascus firefighter, was one of the first people to arrive at the explosion scene. He reported hearing a loud explosion from his home about 3 miles away on Duck Creek Road that “shook my windows and entire home,” he stated in a document.

He saw light smoke, got into his vehicle and headed toward the explosion. He could see “debris falling from above as I arrived at the location,” he stated.

He spoke to a woman who said the homeowners were at home but she did not know what happened to them. Myers saw “a small fire burning” behind the foundation of the back side of the house and a “small debris fire burning just north of the (left) side side.”

He checked under a mattress in the street and did not find a victim. But he did find two victims in the basement, one of whom was a man near the northeast corner of the foundation near some “flames and burning debris,” he stated.

He and a neighbor lifted the man out of the basement. Then two others joined, and they carried the man on a makeshift backboard made of damaged plywood toward a just-arriving ambulance crew.

Myers then received instructions from a Canfield fire captain and assisted one of the Canfield firefighters in applying water to the fire at the northeast corner of the home. “While trying to extinguish flames, we discovered a third victim, a female” in the same area where they found the man, he stated.

He noted that in the northeast corner, the fire “was being fed by a gas source, presumably propane, as once a neighbor shut the valve on the tank behind the garage (northeast corner), the fire was able to be extinguished.”

He noted there also was fire burning along the south (right) wall of the foundation. He spoke with Jillian Smith, assistant Ellsworth fire chief, two days later to discuss his report, and Smith informed him that the man he and the other bystanders rescued did not survive.

KOCANYARS

Jeff and JoAnn were born in Youngstown. Jeff, 69, graduated from Youngstown Chaney High School. JoAnn, 67, graduated from Austintown Fitch High School. Jeff worked at General Motors Lordstown before retiring, according to their obituary. JoAnn worked at DeAngelo Orthodontics, from which she retired, and later worked for Rulli Brothers. Their dogs, Kusha, Coal and Frasier also died in the explosion.

Julie Lubic, 33, was born in Youngstown and graduated in 2009 from Western Reserve High School. She was artistic director for hair color at Reverie Salon, according to her obituary.

Adam Lubic, 33, was born in Charlotte and graduated from St. Thomas Aquinas High School in Louisville, Ohio, according to his obituary. He worked for Winston & Strawn LLP as manager for the IT Security Team.