A gas leak triggered an explosion that leveled a church in Boonville, New York, on Tuesday morning, critically injuring the pastor and four firefighters who had responded to the scene. The building, home to Abundant Life Fellowship in Oneida County, is considered destroyed.

Pastor Brandon Pitts, 43, and three firefighters were in the basement of the church when the furnace kicked in and ignited the leaking propane, according to state police. A fourth firefighter was on the first floor attempting to ventilate the building. All five men were critically hurt, the NY Post reported.

What Happened Inside That Church

The sequence of events began before the firefighters ever arrived. Pitts and another congregation member had detected the gas leak and called the propane company to respond. Boonville firefighters were dispatched to the church shortly before 10:30 a.m.

What happened next was catastrophic. New York State Police described the scene in a press release:

"One firefighter was on the first floor attempting to ventilate the building at the time of the explosion and was thrown against the wall. The church sustained catastrophic damage and is considered destroyed."

Firefighters Nicholas Amicucci, 43, David Pritchard, 60, and Richard Czajka, 71, were taken to Upstate Hospital along with Pitts. A fourth firefighter, Allan Austin, was transported to Wynn Hospital. State police said there is "no indication of criminal activity at this time" and have launched an investigation.

A Community Responds

Within hours, the church posted on Facebook with details that filled in the picture of a small congregation blindsided by disaster. The post, written by a church member, described the moments before and after the blast:

"Our pastor and another congregation member were present at church and had called the propane company to respond to an obvious gas leak. The two of them and a few other responders were in the building at the time of the explosion."

The post continued with a mix of hope and grief that anyone who has attended a small-town church will recognize immediately:

"They have burns that need medical attention but I think everyone will be just fine physically. The building was nearly fully fully engulfed in flames and smoke when my husband and I left the scene, maybe 15 minutes after the explosion. Please just pray for peace, especially for Pastor Brandon."

That request for prayer, not for outrage or blame, says something about the kind of people who filled that building on Sundays.

The Men Who Walked In

It is worth pausing on who these men are. A 71-year-old volunteer firefighter. A 60-year-old. A pastor who smelled gas and stayed in the building to make sure help was on the way. These are not people who sat at a safe distance and called someone else. They walked toward the danger.

Small-town volunteer fire departments are the backbone of emergency response across rural America. Boonville is a village of a few thousand people in Oneida County. The men who responded Tuesday morning are almost certainly known by name to everyone in town. They coach the youth league. They sit in the next pew. They show up.

That reality makes incidents like this hit differently than a structure fire in a major metro area, where professional departments rotate shifts and casualties are absorbed by a massive apparatus. When a town like Boonville loses a church and nearly loses five of its own in a single morning, the entire community absorbs the blow.

What Comes Next

State police have opened their investigation. Southbound traffic on New York State Route 12 was shut down indefinitely in the aftermath. The propane company that was called to respond has not been publicly identified, and the investigation will presumably examine the source and duration of the leak, the condition of the furnace, and why ventilation efforts were still underway when the ignition occurred.

Those are important questions. Five men are in the hospital with critical injuries because something failed, whether it was equipment, maintenance, inspection protocols, or simply terrible timing. The facts will surface.

For now, a small congregation in upstate New York has no building and a pastor fighting to recover. The request from Abundant Life Fellowship was simple: pray for peace, especially for Pastor Brandon.

That building is gone. The people who filled it are not. And the men who tried to save it proved, one more time, what small towns already know about the people who volunteer.