OWINGS MILLS, Md. — A 57-year-old landscaper was killed when a spark ignited gasoline vapors, starting a fire that engulfed the trailer he was in, Baltimore County Fire Department said.
At 10:12 a.m. Thursday, fire crews responded to the 300 block of Bonnie Meadow Circle in Owings Mills to tame a 23-foot vehicle trailer that was “fully engulfed in flames,” fire officials said. Firefighters had to use foam to eventually bring the “intense fire under control.” Once the fire was out, firefighters found George Louis Kelly, of the the unit block of Montrose Avenue in Owings Mills, dead inside the trailer.
Kelley had been in the Bonnie Meadow Circle neighborhood cutting grass for the GK Enterprise Landscape Co., of which he was the proprietor, the fire department said. Baltimore County Police Fire Investigators spoke to witnesses who said they saw Kelley go into the trailer prior to it erupting in flames.
A 100-gallon gasoline tank had been installed in the front passenger side of the trailer, investigators said. The tank was used to supply fuel to the landscaping equipment. Kelley had been trying to provide power to the tank's fuel pump by connecting it to a lawnmower battery, when a spark ignited the gasoline vapors, causing “a spontaneous eruption of flames,” the fire department said.
