Atmos accused of violating minimum safety standards again

DALLAS-FORT WORTH, Texas - For the third time this year, Atmos Energy has been cited for allegedly violating minimum safety regulations set out by the government.
The citation follows three house explosions over a three-month period.
A just-released report documents a fatal house explosion in Irving, Texas, last January. In it, the Texas Railroad Commission excoriates Atmos for failing to maintain its equipment as required by law.
The findings in the report are among the main reasons Atmos Energy is about to embark on what may be the largest pipeline removal initiative
in Texas history.
In the explosion early in the morning on Jan. 31, natural gas leaked into an Irving residence and ignited. The resulting explosion seriously injured Peggy Mantheiy, who survived. Her husband Joe died a few days later.
Although Atmos Energy crews spent several days repairing natural gas leaks around the Mantheiy's neighborhood, no official cause of the leak has been reported until now.
According to Texas Railroad Commission investigators, "there was a leak on a... compression coupling nut."
It was a "grade one" leak - so powerful that it can be seen in video from the scene bubbling up through the foundation.
The leaking natural gas compression coupling was just a few feet away from the Mantheiy residence, under the ground, attached to the main gas line which runs east and west.
In the days following the explosion, Atmos crews identified 32 similar leaks all over the neighborhood.
That was enough for state regulators to request "replacement of the service lines and their couplings across the entire Irving distribution system."
The findings in the latest report mirror an explosion report issued April 28. In it, Railroad Commission investigators recommended "replacement of all steel service lines in Mesquite" following the blast that leveled Kristi Samons’ house in November.
In the days following her house explosion, workers discovered not only a leaking compression coupling behind her house, but 61 other leaks in the surrounding neighborhood.
Two weeks earlier, the Texas Railroad Commission released another report documenting an explosion in Lancaster in November 2009. In that case, gas leaking from a pipe connection found its way from under the street into a residence. One person was severely burned when the house exploded.
Again, Atmos was cited for "violations of the minimum safety regulations."

Northwestern Energy blames frost, not negligence, for fatal Montana blast

BOZEMAN, Mont. - Natural external forces, like frost heaving, may have been
responsible for a natural gas pipe failure that caused a fatal explosion in downtown Bozeman last March, Northwestern Energy chief executive officer Bob Rowe said on Aug. 24.
Rowe was seeking to answer the question, at least in his view, of who is liable for the millions that will be required to rebuild half the 200 block of East Main Street in Bozeman.
"What (investigators) are seeing so far is not showing liability on our part," Rowe told about 50 people gathered at the Bozeman Public Library. "If there's a natural occurrence, it's not a liability." Liability is based on negligence, he said.
Although the investigation is still not complete, there is nothing to suggest the service line that failed had undergone gradual deterioration, Rowe said.
The "freshness" of the 7.5-inch crack that went three-quarters of the way around the 2-inch service line, indicated it was caused by "sudden forces" and "very close to the time of the explosion," Rowe said.
As to which came first, the crack in the pipe or the explosion, Rowe said after the meeting: "There may never be a definitive answer."
Rowe acknowledged that the various insurance companies involved in the investigation may have different opinions. "It's probable, rather likely, that conclusions will differ," Rowe said.
And though the mood at the meeting was more than civil - many who had questions for Rowe also thanked him for his company's response to the blast - that didn't deter those people from voicing their frustration.
"It took 15 to 16 hours to turn the gas off two years ago" when there was a significant natural gas leak behind the parking garage construction on East Mendenhall Street, said Mike Hope, owner of the Rocking R Bar that was destroyed in the March 5 blast. "Didn't you learn something then? Was there anything done back then?"