Kathy DeRenzi had not planned to speak to reporters when she stood with residents on a dirt mound Tuesday at the San Bruno intersection where, nearly two years ago, a natural-gas line exploded and killed eight of her neighbors.
But as elected officials stood at a podium and touted legislation that would force Pacific Gas and Electric Co. to prioritize safety measures and improve its pipelines, DeRenzi feared the message would go unnoticed. People read anniversary stories and they move on with their lives.
"I just don't want people to forget about us," DeRenzi said as tears streamed down her face. "I used to trust PG&E. I used to walk over those orange dots (that marked the pipeline's path) and think nothing of it. Now I see one of their trucks in our neighborhood and I can't even look at it."
As the second anniversary of the Sept. 9, 2010, explosion approaches, residents in the Crestmoor neighborhood still struggle to make sense of the seemingly random disaster that injured more than 50 people and destroyed 38 homes. They live in fear that it could happen again - at any moment.
"The physical rebuild is ongoing," said Mayor Jim Ruane, announcing that eight homes have been completed. "The psychological rebuild will take a lot longer. And frankly, for some people, it'll never happen."
For DeRenzi, life in the neighborhood has been anything but normal since 2010.
The sound of the 30-inch gas pipeline exploding sent her fleeing into the street, about 200 yards from the epicenter but directly into the path of the inferno. The heat from the fire scalded her backside and she recalled being knocked to the asphalt, perhaps by a secondary explosion.
DeRenzi struggled to her feet, ran down a wooded gulch and arrived on a side street, shoeless and bloodied, where she flagged down a car to take her to the hospital.
She still had no idea if a plane had struck her house or if her family was safe.
Her Claremont Drive house suffered fire damage but was not red-tagged, and her husband and children made it out alive.
Since then, she's evacuated the home twice more - once in a panic after an explosion-like sound came from a neighbor's backyard when workers struck a sewer line, and again last month, after contractors pierced a 2-inch gas line at Earl Avenue and Glenview Drive - the same intersection where the now-capped larger line exploded.
For more than a year, the Crestmoor neighborhood has been a construction zone. The noise from backhoes and tractors is constant, DeRenzi said, and dust is ever-present. She wonders if the air quality is safe, if her once-quiet neighborhood can ever heal.
"I would move if I could afford it," DeRenzi said. "Believe me, as soon as I can, I will."
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