Ruptured Gas Line Leaves Large Area Without Gas

I wasn't sure where to put this, so feel free to move.

The entire area where I live is without gas...for THREE to SIX weeks! That's the rumor among the HVAC guys anyway.

The reported cause was 'a farmer accidently ruptured a gas line', but from the looks of the outage I suspect it's worse than that.

BREAKING - MANY IN LC VALLEY EXPERIENCING NATURAL GAS OUTAGE: Avista Utilities customers are experiencing a natural gas outage in various parts of the LC Valley. The company said this afternoon that an incident north of Pullman is causing the outage. Avista has not yet said when service will be restored. We are working to gather more details. More on this story available at this link - www.bigcountrynewsconnection.com...… See more

Here's the map Avista (gas company) put out.


Fast-food restaurants are a huge business here, so it didn't take long for world to get around. I'm not sure how many will survive 6 weeks without gas. We're also a major retirement area, so I wonder how all of the senior homes and nursing homes are going to keep the heat on, let alone cook for residents.

This is not good....

Some of the comments on FB are interesting. to say the least.

From the power company rep:

Thank you for reaching out. I’m sorry to hear that you have been impacted by the gas outage in your area. Currently, we are working with the Williams Pipeline team to understand their planned restoration efforts and to assess the potential severity of impacts to our system. As a result of this incident, for safety reasons and due to expected low gas pressure, we have had to disconnect gas to impacted customers.
Once repairs have been made, we will reach out to the customers that have been impacted to schedule a time for us to come back out and relight your pilot lights.
-Jessie

From a resident.

Thank you for reaching out. I’m sorry to hear that you have been impacted by the gas outage in your area. Currently, we are working with the Williams Pipeline team to understand their planned restoration efforts and to assess the potential severity of impacts to our system. As a result of this incident, for safety reasons and due to expected low gas pressure, we have had to disconnect gas to impacted customers.
Once repairs have been made, we will reach out to the customers that have been impacted to schedule a time for us to come back out and relight your pilot lights.
-Jessie

That's THOUSANDS of residents!

I always thought there were lots of shutoff valves to prevent large areas from loosing gas. This sure seems to be on a mega-scale for some farmer rupturing a gas line.

One fire department is handing out heaters. I can see a run on electric appliances and BBQ's in the next day or two.
Our power grid is notoriously old and patched together from decades of kicking the can down the road. It barely holds up on a good day, so fingers crossed this doesn't bring it down, too.

Are you set up to burn cord wood for heat?

a reply to: nugget1

Please don’t smoke or light a match. That is big area! Be careful!

a reply to: visitedbythem

If nugget lights anything we might have some chicken nuggets.

originally posted by: visitedbythem
Are you set up to burn cord wood for heat?

No, but we have a propane furnace. The little town I'm in doesn't have natural gas, so we're not affected-unless the grid goes down. lol

originally posted by: JJproductions
a reply to: visitedbythem

If nugget lights anything we might have some chicken nuggets.

Please don’t smoke or light a match.

I don't and won't.

a reply to: nugget1

Haha! I love that photo!

Well, a little more to add to the intrigue! Let's play 'Pass the Buck'!

(From FB again)

IT’s NOT AVISTA LINE, It’s the company that supplies gas for Avista

Thank you for reaching out. I’m sorry to hear that you have been impacted by the gas outage in your area. Currently, we are working with the Williams Pipeline team to understand their planned restoration efforts and to assess the potential severity of impacts to our system. As a result of this incident, for safety reasons and due to expected low gas pressure, we have had to disconnect gas to impacted customers.
Once repairs have been made, we will reach out to the customers that have been impacted to schedule a time for us to come back out and relight your pilot lights.
-Jessie

And this from Avista:

Avista logo
Dear Customer,
We want to let you know of an incident today which directly impacts your natural gas service. A gas pipeline owned by a third-party that supplies Avista’s natural gas was struck and damaged. Customers in the areas of Pullman, Moscow, Albion, Palouse, Uniontown, Colton, Genesee, Troy, Bovill, Deary, Asotin, Lewiston and Clarkston are affected.
At this time, we do not know when restoration can begin. We thank you for your patience and understanding as our crews work as quickly and safely as possible to restore your natural gas service. We will provide an update when more details are available. However, we want you to be prepared that this outage could last several days.

I'm guessing over 100,00 people have been impacted. One or two days won't be too bad, but there's going to be some seriously unhappy-and short-tempered-people if this lasts a week or more.

The gas went out around 5 and within an hour every store was out of portable heaters.

The 2 hospitals have no heat or way for their kitchens to operate. Part of the bullet factory can't operate without gas, and I imagine the same holds true for the papermill.....our two biggest employers outside of all the supporting industries for seniors and retired folk.

Glad where I am at (way further north, almost as far north as you can go) wood stoves are still a thing.

I have a toyo as well, just dont want to depend on 1 type of heat as undependable as the power grid is.

In a situation like you have, I would immediately shut off the gas valve at the meter outside. If that main gas pipe was ruptured, air likely got inside. I'm not sure how they purge main lines, but that air needs to be out of there before any pilot lights are relit.

originally posted by: visitedbythem
In a situation like you have, I would immediately shut off the gas valve at the meter outside. If that main gas pipe was ruptured, air likely got inside. I'm not sure how they purge main lines, but that air needs to be out of there before any pilot lights are relit.

The utility company in the Lewiston/Clarkston valley is going door to door too make sure all mains are shut off, then will go around after the pipe is fixed and restart everybody....so they say.

Irishhalf- Good plan to have back-up heat available!

The original map was revised to look a little more manageable.

From FB:
Avista says the incident is having downstream impacts on the ability to serve customers in the Lewiston, Clarkston, Asotin, Pullman, Moscow, Albion, Palouse, Uniontown, Colton, Genesee, Troy, Bovill, and Deary regions. At around 5:00 p.m., Avista customers in the LC Valley and around the region began to report losing service.

"As a result of this incident, for safety reasons and due to expected low gas pressure, Avista crews will likely have to disconnect gas service to impacted customers," says an Avista press release.

They're saying they 'hope' to have everything fixed by Friday afternoon, but I imagine checking each and every house is going to take a whole lot longer.

One thing's for sure; we've got a massive rate hike coming soon and the CEO of Avista will probably get a lot more than his standard 2million$$ bonus this year.

Update from this morning:

LEWISTON - Avista says crews must go to each gas meter to make sure they are manually turned off - as it is required as part of the service restoration process. The company says those who are comfortable with turning their valve off at the meter can do so, but personnel will still have to verify the meter is off. After the pipeline is repaired, the company says they will again return to each location to turn on the meters and re-light pilot lights.

I hope the massive temporary help they're going to have to hire is competent!

I'm right here with you Nugget. I'm in Pullman but luckily my house has no gas anymore. But I feel for all my neighbors around us.