Phoenix House Residents Face Another Year Away After Fatal Austintown Blast

Nearly a year after a gas explosion tore through Phoenix House Apartments and killed one resident, the seven-story Austintown senior housing complex still isn’t ready for anyone to move back in — and local leaders now say it could be another full year before that happens. Thirty-eight of the residents displaced by the blast are still staying in Boardman, supported by the United Way, while crews work through a lengthy list of repairs inside the building.

The explosion struck the fourth floor of the HUD-subsidized Section 8 building at 850 N. Meridian Road shortly before 1 p.m. on November 22, 2025, injuring at least 10 residents and prompting a mutual-aid response from six area fire departments — Austintown, Boardman, Canfield, Girard, Weathersfield, and Youngstown — according to WKYC 3News. Firefighters used ladder trucks to pull trapped residents from the building’s upper floors during the chaotic rescue. Authorities have attributed the blast to a gas leak. As WKBN.com reports, the explosion ultimately displaced roughly 140 residents from the income-based studio apartments, which have served low-income seniors and residents with disabilities for more than 40 years.

The human toll extended beyond the initial injuries. Sixty-three-year-old resident Steven D. Smith, who was airlifted with severe burn injuries, died on December 2, 2025, at Cleveland MetroHealth Medical Center, according to the Tribune Chronicle. He was the last resident still hospitalized following the blast.

Repairs Still Have a Long Way to Go

Austintown Township Trustee Bruce Shepas said insurance issues have contributed to the delay in progress, per the same WKBN report. Crews began exterior work in April, according to the building’s owner, and are now preparing to shift focus to interior damage — including sprinkler systems, HVAC systems, and elevators — once that exterior work wraps up.

“There is still a lot of work to be done,” Shepas said, though he added that he believes all displaced residents will eventually return to their homes. Local leaders now say Phoenix House likely won’t reopen for at least another year from this week.

Why the Rebuild Has Dragged On

Structural evaluations conducted after the disaster found that while the upper-floor exterior walls were destroyed, the building’s underlying concrete and steel framework remained sound — the reason ownership opted for a multi-year rehabilitation rather than demolition, per The Vindicator. But that same sturdiness has created a bureaucratic bind: under Ohio Revised Code, municipalities can only hold insurance escrow payments for property upkeep if structural damage exceeds 60 percent of a building’s total insured value. Austintown officials say Phoenix House never reached that threshold, leaving the township with limited leverage over ownership group Austintown Studio Apartments / Phoenix House Investments as repairs have stretched on.

Facility ownership contracted directly with the Austintown Police Department to provide 24-hour security at the site while insurance adjusters inspected the interior damage, according to the same outlet's earlier reporting.

A Massive, Multi-Agency Response

The scale of the initial evacuation was staggering: 82 displaced residents were bused out on transit and school buses to a temporary reception center set up at Austintown Elementary School the day of the blast. Mahoning County Commissioners later commended regional dispatchers for coordinating the 16-hour emergency shift, the paper's reporting notes.

Even residents’ pets weren’t left behind — the Mahoning County Dog Warden worked with Animal Charity of Ohio to shelter displaced animals while their owners moved into temporary housing. And when emergency hotel funding for displaced residents expired, those still without permanent housing faced a January 15 deadline to find longer-term arrangements, prompting local non-profits to organize housing fairs, according to WKBN’s earlier reporting.

Longer-term relocation has relied on a broad coalition of agencies, including Catholic Charities, Direction Home, the American Red Cross, and housing authorities across Mahoning and Trumbull counties, which have helped residents transfer their federal Section 8 vouchers to available apartments elsewhere in the region. For the 38 residents still waiting in Boardman with United Way support, that patchwork of aid remains the bridge between the explosion that upended their homes and whatever comes next once Phoenix House finally reopens.