Gas Fumes Force Monroe Street Family to Evacuate Cellar Following Night Crash
A 21-year-old Brockton man was hospitalized after his car struck the porch and cellar wall of a house on Monroe Street at 1 a.m. today. Paul M. McLaughlin of 266 Forest St. was in fair condition and on the danger list at Norwood Hospital with a fractured arm and wrist and multiple cuts of the face. Floyd J. Cormier of 126 Monroe St. and four members of his family were awakened by the crash and forced to the street when a gas meter was torn from the cellar wall and fumes filled the house.
McLaughlin was trapped in the wreckage of the car for 20 minutes before he was removed by firefighters who pried loose a wooden beam which smashed through the windshield. Police said the car narrowly missed a tree and a utility pole in front of the Cormier house before it crashed into the porch and demolished a section of the cellar wall. Residential wreckage was pried apart by Norwood firefighters after the car rammed the building. Five persons were forced from the house when the collision ripped the gas meter away and gas escaped.
Gas and electricity to the house were disconnected by utility crews. The Cormier family spent the night at the home of Mr. and Mrs. David Crowley at 122 Monroe St. They were Mr. Cormier; Paul J. Cormier, 9; Patricia Cormier, 14; Mary Cormier, 17; and Miss Edith McArdle, an aunt of Mrs. Cormier. Mrs. Cormier, a registered nurse, was at work at Norwood Hospital at the time of the accident.
Archival Note: This article has been dynamically reconstructed from the original public record print archives of the Patriot Ledger
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