'Like an earthquake': 17 years later, Bozeman hasn't forgotten fatal downtown gas explosion

People who were there say the snow feels familiar. Seventeen years after a gas explosion tore through downtown Bozeman on March 5, 2009, killing 36-year-old Tara Bowman and collapsing nearly an entire city block, Thursday’s wet, wintry weather brought the memory rushing back.

For Jennifer Frederick, sales manager at Altitude Gallery, it’s the smell that stays with her — like wet, burning paper, she said — along with the memories of Bowman, a personal friend.

“When people pass away, I feel like their brightest parts come out. But with her, every day her brightest parts came out,” Frederick said. “She was a literal walking ray of sunshine, just like the biggest smile you could ever imagine.”

Bowman managed Montana Trails Gallery, and was inside the building when the blast hit. Investigators determined that a separation in a NorthWestern Energy gas line behind the building had allowed gas to migrate underground and into surrounding structures. Bowman’s husband later filed a wrongful death lawsuit against NorthWestern Energy, which was ultimately settled.

The explosion was centered at Boodles restaurant at 215 East Main at 8:12 a.m. Boodles was destroyed, as were the The Rockin’ R Bar, Montana Trails Gallery and the American Legion club.

That same morning, Frederick was at a gym just a few buildings away. She remembered the elliptical machine jolting from side to side seconds before the boom, leaving everyone at the gym in shock.

“We just got off of our machines, and walked to the front door,” Frederick said. “Something bad had happened, and we didn’t know what it was.”

With smoke and debris clouding the block, Frederick walked home in a daze, unsure if the blast was a bombing, an accident, something else entirely. Scott Sanders, now a battalion chief with the Bozeman Fire Department, remembers that uncertainty on people’s faces when he responded to the scene as a firefighter that morning.

“It was super eerie, that’s what I remember the most,” Sanders said. “The people we did see were all in shock, just had the look on their faces. It looked like something out of a movie.”

The American Legion bar on Main Street was destroyed and later rebuilt. On the second floor, a framed photo of the explosion still hangs as a reminder of what once stood there.

Current manager Mike Schaff was working at a different downtown establishment at the time, but felt the impact before he even made it to work that morning.

“I was like three blocks away, and I felt it when it happened,” Schaff said. “It felt like an earthquake.”

Sanders remembers extinguishing fires at the Legion for days after the explosion, and said he and his crew were downtown for the next week preserving the scene and handling the damage that extended for blocks.

“I remember a door off the back of one of the buildings back there. I’d never seen a steel door get imbedded into a brick wall,” Sanders said. “So much force, I thought that’s not even possible.”

He called it a once in a lifetime event, both in his career and for the city of Bozeman. Bowman’s death and the shattering of long-held business staples, he said, sent shockwaves throughout the community. But he remembers many locals turned that shock into an outpouring of support for the department.

“Our station was full of people just wanting to help. I didn’t know any of them,” Sanders said. “It was neat to see the community really come together, and the departments. We worked well with our partners. We just came together and got through it.”

Gwen Wardell, owner of Main Street Quilting Company, felt that same urge to help. She was not downtown when the explosion hit, but still remembers the immediate shock of hearing the news.

Back then, before she owned the shop, she worked there on the weekends. When she returned, she remembers a “cavernous hole” left in the street. But the real impact on the community, Wardell said, came with the mourning of Bowman.

“Just the shock of being saddened by Tara’s loss of life,” Wardell said. “I went to high school with her. I don’t remember her real well. We didn’t run in the same circles, but you still get affected to think of somebody your age.”

The block is now rebuilt, with the new brick buildings blending seamlessly with the historical structures filling the rest of Main Street. Through the long rebuilding process, Wardell said what stands out to her is the solidarity from the community.

“Downtown is resilient, and I’m glad for that,” Wardell said. “I’m glad to see the community supporting the downtown area. It’s just nice to know that if something else happened down here, we’d all help each other out.”