{"id":178006,"date":"2026-02-24T13:42:09","date_gmt":"2026-02-24T13:42:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/178006\/"},"modified":"2026-02-24T13:42:09","modified_gmt":"2026-02-24T13:42:09","slug":"multiple-explosions-fires-cause-homeless-camp-concerns-in-austin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/178006\/","title":{"rendered":"&#8216;Multiple explosions,&#8217; fires cause homeless camp concerns in Austin"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<img fetchpriority=\"high\" width=\"300\" height=\"169\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/image-Travis-Co-1-300x169.png\" class=\"attachment-medium size-medium wp-image-779300\" alt=\"\"   loading=\"eager\" decoding=\"async\"\/>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n<p>PHOTOS: Jack Muimandi said it felt like the start of an earthquake. \u201cAll of a sudden, I just felt this really loud explosion,\u201d he recalled. \u201cLike, I felt it. The whole apartment rocked.\u201d <\/p>\n<p>The Austin Fire Department described \u201cmultiple explosions\u201d and 15-foot high flames sparked by \u201cencampment activity\u201d near Muimandi\u2019s Tech Ridge apartment complex on Dec. 30, according to the incident report \u2014 one of hundreds of fires a KXAN investigation found likely connected to homeless encampments in recent months. <\/p>\n<p>In this case, fire crews reported finding \u201cseveral dozen\u201d gas tanks littering the grassy area between the complex and an adjacent movie theater.<\/p>\n<p>Just under three weeks later, in the early morning hours of Jan. 18, it happened again. The explosions and fires on both days were \u201ca result of gas tanks\u201d and \u201chave been attributed to encampment activity,\u201d an AFD spokesperson confirmed.<\/p>\n<p>On a recent visit to the complex off I-35 and East Parmer Lane, we spotted piles of debris and remnants of an abandoned campsite.<\/p>\n<p>KXAN-TV NBC 36 Austin<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PHOTOS: Jack Muimandi said it felt like the start of an earthquake. \u201cAll of a sudden, I just&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":178007,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[132,134,133,27],"class_list":{"0":"post-178006","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-austin","8":"tag-austin","9":"tag-austin-headlines","10":"tag-austin-news","11":"tag-texas"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/178006","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=178006"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/178006\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/178007"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=178006"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=178006"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=178006"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}