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Third death reported from Minneapolis apartment blast

by Reuters
Sunday, 5 January 2014 02:11 GMT

Jan 4 (Reuters) - A third person has died from an explosion and fire at a Minneapolis apartment building on New Year's Day that also left at least 13 others injured, medical examiners said on Saturday.

The latest victim was Abdiqani Adan, 29, who died in a hospital from injuries sustained in the incident, the Hennepin County Medical Examiner's office said in a statement.

Investigators have been looking into a gas leak as a possible cause for the blast and fire that destroyed the three-story building with a ground-floor grocery store and 10 apartments. The building was located in a community of mainly Somali immigrants.

The roof and upper floors of the 1886 building collapsed, leaving unstable ice-caked exterior walls and rubble.

Demolition of the building was completed on Friday and fire officials believe that everyone who was in the building has been accounted for, the department said in a statement.

The cause of the blast remains undetermined.

(Reporting by Kevin Murphy; Editing by Jon Herskovitz and Dan Grebler)

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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