Utility crews will be back on the scene of a home explosion in Springfield this morning.

The house at 2550 West Chestnut Street in west Springfield was blown to the ground just before 4:00 pm Thursday afternoon.

KOLR10's Jessica Williams is back live there this morning.
Jessica, do investigators now know the cause?

Yes, they are saying is was a natural gas leak that caused this destruction.
As you can see there really isn't much left of this house.

And as you can tell, the homes surrounding it are all damaged.
In fact, the city of Springfield says five homes besides this one are uninhabitable, at least for the time being.
Amazingly, the couple who lived in this house were not at home at the time of the explosion and it likely saved their lives.

 "It's something that you... I just lost everything," said homeowner Lee Brown. Brown and his wife were away from the house at the time.  He returned, stunned, to find little left but a huge pile of debris.  "The only thing I know... I found out as soon as I got here, that the neighbors were okay.  I mean, my neighbor's house was half gone.  I mean, I'm more worried about here than I am me right now.  I mean, I, other than that I don't know what to say."

Homes blocks away had windows broken and pictures knocked off the walls -- one firefighter even reported hearing the blast over five miles away, east of Highway 65.

We've also learned that three children were taken to the hospital by their parents as a result of the explosion.
A family member says a 15-year old, 9-year old and 7-year old were in a car across the street from the house when it exploded.

Some of the homeowners of these damaged houses told us yesterday that they were going to spend the night out here to keep looters out.
And as we mentioned earlier, crews will be back here on scene early this morning to continue their investigation.

Utility crews will also be here to work on getting power back on for the neighbors.
We do know 12 people are directly affected.

They will be living either without power, or even a home.
The American Red Cross is working with the displaced families to help them find a place to stay.