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What would you do - MVC with Natural Gas Leaking from building -
What would you do for the following scenario?
Sunday, 5:30 in the afternoon, Bedroom community. Mini van runs into furniture resale shop with two apartment above, shearing off three (3) residential gas meters to building. Driver exits vehicle and leaves Mini Van running. Vehicle was traveling westbound downhill toward main road through town when driver lost control.
See picture below:
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Courtney Marx on
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Thank you for your reply Jeff. The responding department left the vehicle running for nearly 3 hours on top of the gas line still releasing gas. Finally the gas company hooked up and pulled the car off the gas meters using a flat bed tow truck. All citizens in a 2 block radius were asked by reverse 911 to stay in their homes and the power to 4 buildings was shut down.
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Permalink Reply by Mike Schlags (Captain Busy) Retd on
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Hey Courtney, There are a couple of options here. You could announce on loud speakers for everyone to run for their lives. Seeing that this run occurred at 5:30 AM, it wouldn't hurt to blast air horns and sirens to alert residents. I've always liked that option but never could find a reason to use it... Plus, you probably are going to piss off a couple of folks... Oh well, so much for having some fun.
Key point with this incident is to deal with immediate life safety issues, e.g. get rid of any ignition course, including turning off the running mini-van and killing power to the affected building, and having other residents shelter in place. This should be a no brainer incident that is resolved as soon as you cut the gas supply and kill ignition sources.
Not knowing what kind of rate of release the gas was flowing, nor ambient temperatures and wind, it's hard to second guess how extensive both evacuation and cutting power to buildings you have to get. Also, the ETA of the gas company is an important factor.
Typically, there is enough ambient air to dilute the air/gas ratio when a release occurs outdoors like this one did. One of the biggest nuisances is the Mercaptan additive they put in the gas... Controlling ignition sources, and shutting off the gas to the involved structure needs to occur quickly. Now you are just dealing with a vehicle into a building and having law enforcement getting a tow truck...
On a hazmat side here, it would not hurt to monitor the inside of the structure and if found necessary, ventilate the structure (if it was compromised from the collision) to prevent any accumulation of natural gas inside the structure.
CBz
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