LOUISVILLE, Ky. — Louisville officials held a community meeting Monday night to share details about the house found with explosives and hazardous materials last week.

During a question-and-answer session, officials addressed concerns for over 500 neighbors in attendance about when the controlled burn will occur, and what affects it may have. 

What You Need To Know

  • Mayor Craig Greenberg, D-Louisville, announced a controlled burn for a house found to have hazardous and explosive materials 

  • Louisville Metro Police investigated one property on Applegate Lane, finding a man who showed them what he said were homemade explosives

  • The city has not set a date for the controlled burn, but officials held a community meeting Monday 

  • Jazmin Perez lives directly across the house and shared her concerns

Jasmin Perez and her family live directly across the house on Applegate Lane.

It’s now condemned because her neighbor, Marc Hibel, as LMPD disclosed, may have filled the house with toxic chemicals and explosives.

“It’s going to be better without him living here, so that’s going to be a lot nicer,” Perez said. “You don’t have to consistently worry about him coming over, because that’s what he was doing. Just inviting himself over into our backyard if we were out there.”

Louisville Mayor Craig Greenberg said the city has reached out to the Environmental Protection Agency for an evaluation of the house on Applegate Lane.

“They will be exploring other options before we move forward with this monitored and controlled burn. So that probably means that before this might happen, it will be a little bit longer of a period of time it does but again, safety is the number one priority,” Greenberg said.

Louisville Metro Emergency Services Executive Director Jody Meiman said he and his team are looking at several factors in scheduling the burn, but the main one is the weather.

“Some of the things that you can expect 24 hours before the actual burn takes place is obviously, we’ve got to localize the street,” Meiman explained. “We’ve got to close the street down for just residents that are on that street. So the first responders can come in and actually set up the house for the burn that’s going to take place.”

LMPD Police Chief Jacquelyn Gwinn-Villaroel says during the time of the controlled burn, officers will work with the community and protect homes during the evacuation.

“The conditions of the home, as you stated before, is a hoarder type of situation, which is very dangerous for anybody to be inside and to navigate through that with the unknown what is actually going on in their home that we don’t know about,” Gwinn-Villaroel said.

Some things officials want you to keep in mind when the controlled burn occurs if you live in the area: turn off the air conditioner, take your pets with you during the evacuation and cover your pools and ponds.

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