Tense moments after gas leak last week near high school
A broken gas line near 13th Street West and !0th Avenue resulted in a tense few hours May 11 as home on the block had nearly 95% of natural gas in its air, Columbia Falls Fire Chief Karl Weeks said.
By CHRIS PETERSON
Hungry Horse News
A broken gas line near 13th Street West and !0th Avenue resulted in a tense few hours May 11 as home on the block had nearly 95% of natural gas in its air, Columbia Falls Fire Chief Karl Weeks said.
The leak wasn’t in the home, however. It was in a two-inch line underground on 10th Avenue.
At 95%, in theory there is too much gas in a home to cause an explosion, Weeks noted, because there’s not enough oxygen. Natural gas most readily burns when it’s at 4% to 14% in the air, Weeks said.
Still, there was tense moments as the house was ventilated and the density went through that flammable range.
The line hadn’t been dug up either, it simply cracked, Weeks noted.
No one was home at the house, so firefighters had to slowly ventilate the structure while crews from Northwestern Energy looked for the leak.
The leak was discovered by Columbia Falls Police Chief Clint Peters who smelled the gas while on patrol. The call came in at 2:23 p.m. Firefighters were cleared at 7:11 p.m.
Residents later said they smelled gas, but none apparently reported it.
“Luckily, it didn’t find a source of ignition,” Weeks said.
Police and fire closed off a block area around the leak and Flathead Electric disconnected the power. Since the leak was outside, neighbors were told to shelter in place.
Still, folks didn’t seem to heed the warning. Weeks noted that people still drove through barricades and one person rode a bicycle up to the scene as well.
The odor of gas was apparent even a hundred yards from the leak.
In 2010, a natural gas leak in Columbia Falls did explode and killed a Northwestern Energy worker, flattened a home and damaged others. That leak, however, was believed to be caused after a line was damaged by another utility company and the gas seeped into the home through a sewer line.
Northwestern Energy employee Jim Hilton was killed in the blast that flattened the home of Ted Langton on Second Avenue West.
In last week’s case, the gas line appeared to simply fail, Weeks noted.
Folks are reminded to always report gas odors no matter what.