The Nation - News from April 24, 1988

The death toll climbed to five after workers toiled overnight looking for victims in the rubble after explosions leveled a riverside grain elevator complex in Joliet, Ill. “There were five people unaccounted for and we have recovered all five,” said Joliet Police Capt. James Grace. Authorities at first believed that another person had been blown into the Des Plaines River from a barge by the force of the explosion, but said they no longer believe that report. Rescue workers are continuing their search in the area “just as a precaution,” Grace said. Authorities suspect grain dust, which can be as volatile as dynamite, may have caused the first explosion, which apparently ruptured a natural gas main and touched off a second blast moments later.