After an explosion in the Bronx caused a partial collapse of a high-rise apartment building on October 1, many residents say they are still left with no gas in their building.<\/p>\n
Jomayra Guzman used to cook every day, but lately, her stove has been serving as a shelf.<\/p>\n
She says it hasn’t worked in three weeks.<\/p>\n
The mother of two still has most of her belongings in bags just in case something happens again.<\/p>\n
Guzman lives in the Mitchel Houses NYCHA complex in the Bronx where a suspected gas leak caused an explosion and partial collapse of the building earlier this month. <\/a><\/p>\n Guzman’s unit is next to the ventilation shaft that came crashing down.<\/p>\n A NYCHA spokesperson said, “Heat and hot water service has been restored via mobile boilers; however, gas restoration work is ongoing. Gas service interruptions and restoration work are a matter of public safety and involve multiple partners and steps.”<\/p>\n NYCHA, meanwhile, has distributed over 1,000 hot plates and over 1,000 slow cookers to residents, but Guzman’s is back in its box, because she says it takes too long to heat up.<\/p>\n And her daughter Jaliyah sleeps with mom now after being traumatized from the collapse and they say, despite what NYCHA says, they still have no heat.<\/p>\n “It’s like cold to the point where I have to use the blanket and kind of just like basically make myself into a burrito,” her daughter Jaliyah said.<\/p>\n Across the hall, Marlene Cintron uses her slow cooker but she has the opposite problem.<\/p>\n “When you connect it and it finally does heat up, it goes off and it sets off the box, and it turns everything off,” Cintron said.<\/p>\n Only her bedroom has heat, but she doesn’t sleep there.<\/p>\n “I felt everything. I still sleep in the living room, my bedroom is literally right at the wall that collapsed down. So my wall is here. The wall collapse was here. Straight down,” Cintron said.<\/p>\n As for the gas, tenants say maintenance workers have told them it might not come back until sometime next year.<\/p>\n NYCHA has said they’re working to restore it as quickly as possible.<\/p>\n * Get Eyewitness News Delivered<\/a> Submit a tip or story idea to Eyewitness News<\/p>\n
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