Two people killed in Pennsylvania house explosion

(Reuters) - Two people died in an early morning house explosion on Tuesday in a rural area of western Pennsylvania, local emergency officials said. The explosion happened at 4 a.m. at a home in South Beaver Township, about 40 miles northwest of Pittsburgh, according to Beaver County Emergency Services Crew Chief Jeff Bolland. Bolland could not give the age and sex of the victims, but local media reported that they were a man and woman. The cause of the explosion was not yet known. South Beaver Township Police Chief Dan McLean said the explosion was heard from several miles away. "It was a pretty loud explosion - a pretty big explosion," McLean said in an interview on WPXI-TV in Pittsburgh. Pictures of the scene on local television showed the home reduced to rubble. (Reporting by Mary Wisniewski; Editing by Susan Heavey)