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ST. LOUIS COUNTY — Sheila Calvin used a cane on Tuesday to walk to the front stoop of her condemned home on Belcroft Drive. Taped to the wall, a red paper notice warned of the dangers: “Unsafe. Do not enter or occupy,� it read.

The trusses — beams that hold up the roof — are blown out, a contractor told her. He asked what she needed from inside.

“We need shoes,� Calvin said.

The corner of Belcroft and Evan Aire Drive, near Black Jack in north St. Louis County, was covered Tuesday in the leftovers of an explosion that shook the neighborhood the day prior, destroying three houses, damaging almost two dozen, evacuating residents and injuring at least five people, including an 18-year-old who was hospitalized with life-threatening injuries.

On Tuesday, inspectors walked the blocks near the explosion. Crews with the region’s natural gas utility, Spire, dug with a backhoe. A priest and a police captain made the rounds. A few neighbors sat on their front porches, feeling lucky if all they had were broken windows. Some complained about gawkers driving by.

Yards here were covered in house insulation, nails, siding and wood. A mangled satellite dish was planted in one yard.

Eugene Casimere rolled a 50-gallon trash bin loaded with plywood and roof shingles — debris that torpedoed his yard — to the street, dumped it out and headed back up his driveway.

“My fourth load today,� said Casimere, 56, who lives on Belcroft across from the destroyed homes. “This is the hand I’m dealt. What else can you do?�

Casimere said Tuesday was cleanup day. He carried his cellphone around with him all day, hoping the insurance adjustor would call. His boss at AT&T gave him a week off.

Authorities said on Monday that the regional bomb and arson squad was investigating. Late Tuesday, St. Louis County Police Chief Col. Kenneth Gregory said investigators had ruled out criminal behavior and were investigating the blast as a “likely gas incident.�

Jason Merrill, a spokesman for Spire, the region’s natural gas utility, said Monday crews did not find any signs of a leak on Evan Aire or Belcroft. He also said no one had called the company to report the smell of gas before the blast. On Tuesday he said he couldn’t speak to leaks inside the homes.

David Wrone, a spokesperson for the St. Louis County Department of Transportation and Public Works, said inspectors were out Tuesday assessing damage to about 20 homes, many of them red-tagged, and helping residents figure out next steps to have the properties repaired and reinspected.

He warned it would be a long process, given the extent of the damages.

Many of the homes’ roofs were lifted up in the air by the blast and then dropped back down onto the walls, Wrone said. Garages were collapsed in on themselves, walls cracked and windows blown out.

“It was a very, very violent detonation,� he said.

Black Jack fire Chief Paul Peebles said the 18-year-old remained hospitalized on Tuesday.

Casimere, the Belcroft resident, said his home surveillance camera showed a young man, covered in soot, running from the explosion toward Casimere's front door, then turning down Belcroft before collapsing.

After the explosion, the homes on either side of the house that exploded go up in flames.

On Tuesday, Shel King, who lived in one of those homes, tried to salvage what belongings he could.

His and his wife’s Yorkshire terrier, Major, was killed when the roof collapsed. King, who was asleep in bed, woke up to a loud boom. Then the roof and walls started to collapse.

“I’m still in shock,� he said. “My body aches real bad. Mentally, I’m lost.�

On Tuesday, his house was a pile of wreckage. The frame to the garage was the only part left standing, and it was charred. All of the couple’s belongings were ruined, King said.

“It looks like a bomb hit,� he said. “Everything just burned up.�

A car in the couple’s garage was totaled, and two others parked on the driveway and street were badly damaged in the blast, their windshields cracked and windows and sun roofs blown out.

King, 50, said he considers himself lucky. He was the only one home. They have insurance. He and his wife are staying with family.

“I’m glad I still have my life and I can start back over,� he said. “But now we have to figure it out.�

On Belcroft, Calvin was still trying to get into her home of 20 years.

“Make it quick,� the contractor told her.

She and three relatives gingerly stepped past the glass and the steel and the wood shards.

“If me and my son could get a couple outfits,� said Calvin, 63. “Or something, like underwear, personal stuff. We can make it from there.�

They came out with a rug, several boxes of shoes and a rolled up chalk drawing of Calvin’s son and daughter.

A grandfather clock her husband bought for her more than 30 years ago was somewhere in the back of the home.

They couldn’t get to it.