Delaware Tent Deaths: Initial Findings Suggest Propane Heater Fumes As Culprit In Quadruple-Deaths

Hours after four people were found dead in a tent in a wooded area off Main Street in Stanton, Delaware, new but scarce details were provided to the authorities by the relatives of the victims.

According to ABC affiliate WPVI-TV, relatives who refused to speak in front of the camera said the victims were homeless people from Stanton and two were an uncle-and-nephew pair. The other two were the girlfriend of the nephew and friend.

Aside from the scarce details, investigators revealed that initial findings from the probe suggest the four people may have died from inhaling fumes from a propane heater that was found inside the tent.

An autopsy has yet to be performed by the Delaware Division of Forensic Science to determine the cause of deaths. Investigations are also still going on but so far, Stanton authorities said foul play wasn’t being considered.

Since the deaths were discovered in the woods near a Walgreens store, people started gathering around the area. An onlooker also said news of the deaths was “very shocking,” while another said it was “scary.”

The deaths on Tuesday mark another incident of homeless deaths in Philadelphia as it was revealed in December that the city’s deaths in the streets among homeless people have been rising over the past years.

According to official data released on the City of Philadelphia’s official website, deaths in the city among homeless persons tripled in almost a decade from 43 to 132.

Of the said deaths, almost 60 percent are related to drug use, specifically opioid use. Of the drug-related deaths, 86 percent were cases involving opioids, further heightening worries around the United States’ opioid crisis.

Director of the Office of Homeless Services Liz Hersh said at the time of the data’s release that the report only shows the “profound, and traffic effect” the issue is causing in many states and cities, including Philadelphia.

Homelessness is a problem across Philadelphia, not just in Delaware. People are living in tents due to the lack of affordable housing in the city. As mentioned, drug addiction is also an issue that has yet to be resolved.

An op-ed on the Philadelphia Inquirer wrote that recent data from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development suggest the local government is doing better in terms of offering shelter for homeless people than other cities in the country.

Philadelphia is working on providing homeless people with better access to safe shelters as homeless facilities have limited capacity.