The residential apartment building collapsed and was engulfed in flames along with a neighboring building in New York City's East Village neighborhood, injuring at least twelve people, at least three critically.
Above, New York City Fire Department firefighters walk on 2nd Avenue towards the explosion site.
The New York Times quotes a New York Fire Department official as saying that preliminary indications are that some kind of gas explosion preceded the inferno.
"It was probably a gas thing, it looks like," said spokesperson Francis X. Gribbon. "But that's not confirmed."
[ALL PHOTOS: REUTERS/Mike Segar]