# COLUMBIA GAS OF OHIO INC — Gas distribution — incident on 1988-10-10

**Citation:** PHMSA Report 19880260  
**Type / status:** incident / historical  
**Agency:** Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration  
**Effective:** 1988-10-10  
**Published:** 1988-10-10

Gas distribution incident in GREENWICH, HURON County, OH. Reported cause: OTHER. Reported consequences: 0 fatalities, 1 injuries, $90,000 reported property damage. Operator-reported incident data submitted to PHMSA, generally within 30 days. Records may be supplemented or corrected and do not represent final agency causal findings. PHMSA trend classification: significant incident, serious incident.

## Document text

Gas distribution incident in GREENWICH, HURON County, OH. Reported cause: OTHER. Reported consequences: 0 fatalities, 1 injuries, $90,000 reported property damage. Operator-reported incident data submitted to PHMSA, generally within 30 days. Records may be supplemented or corrected and do not represent final agency causal findings.

Report number: 19880260.

Operator ID: 2596.

Reported incident date: 19881010.

Cause detail: EXPLOSION AND FIRE OCCURRED AT THIS ADDRESS. OCCUPANTS REPORTEDLY HAD SMELLED GAS. THE SON INVESTIGATED ODOR ABOUT 5:00 PM. AND THE FATHER ABOUT 7:00 PM. WHEN THE FATHER, RETURNING FROM THE BASEMENT, TURNED LIGHT OUT, THE EXPLOSION OCCURRED. INVESTIGATION REVEALED THE CUSTOMER OWNED SERICE LINE WOULD NOT WITHSTANDA PRESSURE TEST. FURTHER EXCAVATION REVEALED 1 1/4" PIPE CRACKED IN THE THREADS AT AN ELL IN THE GROUND UNDER THE ADD-ON DINING ROOM AND UPSTREAM OF THE METER.IT HAS NOT BEEN DETERMINED WHETHER THE CRACKED THREADS WERE THE CAUSE OF THE EXPLOSION OR WERE AS A RESULT OF IT.

PHMSA trend classification: significant incident, serious incident.

PHMSA standardized cause: ALL OTHER CAUSES — MISCELLANEOUS.

PHMSA indexed costs: $90,000 reported total cost, $80,699.694 in 1984 dollars, $198,738.509 in current-year dollars.

PHMSA trend flags, standardized causes, and indexed costs are analytical fields added to operator-reported incident data. They do not represent final agency causal findings.

## Provenance

- Official: Yes
- Source: <https://data.transportation.gov/api/views/27nc-rsge/files/7ccf83c5-a778-4c51-ba2d-a9a84e221c7b?download=true&filename=Gas%20Distribution%20Incident%20Data%20-%20mid%201984%20to%20February%202004.zip>
- Source ID: `phmsa-pipeline-incidents`
- SHA-256: `3503e12f865c454ab44dedb1347354e06479a06e9b50a4f1f6ef91beede8d4ac`
- Retrieved: 2026-08-20T03:30:32.010Z
- Exported: 2026-08-25T03:18:23.997Z
- Document slug: `phmsa-incident-40e36a15246b80054e695842`

### Source metadata

```json
{
  "recordKind": "pipeline_incident",
  "datasetType": "gas_distribution",
  "datasetLabel": "Gas distribution",
  "datasetPeriod": "mid 1984 to February 2004",
  "report": {
    "number": "19880260",
    "supplementalNumber": null,
    "type": null,
    "receivedDate": null,
    "receivedDateRaw": null
  },
  "operator": {
    "id": "2596",
    "name": "COLUMBIA GAS OF OHIO INC"
  },
  "incident": {
    "date": "1988-10-10",
    "dateRaw": "19881010"
  },
  "location": {
    "city": "GREENWICH",
    "county": "HURON",
    "state": "OH",
    "postalCode": "44837",
    "latitude": null,
    "longitude": null,
    "type": null,
    "details": {},
    "facilityName": null
  },
  "cause": {
    "category": "OTHER",
    "details": {
      "NARRATIVE": "EXPLOSION AND FIRE OCCURRED AT THIS ADDRESS. OCCUPANTS REPORTEDLY HAD SMELLED GAS. THE SON INVESTIGATED ODOR ABOUT 5:00 PM. AND THE FATHER ABOUT 7:00 PM. WHEN THE FATHER, RETURNING FROM THE BASEMENT, TURNED LIGHT OUT, THE EXPLOSION OCCURRED. INVESTIGATION REVEALED THE CUSTOMER OWNED SERICE LINE WOULD NOT WITHSTANDA PRESSURE TEST. FURTHER EXCAVATION REVEALED 1 1/4\" PIPE CRACKED IN THE THREADS AT AN ELL IN THE GROUND UNDER THE ADD-ON DINING ROOM AND UPSTREAM OF THE METER.IT HAS NOT BEEN DETERMINED WHETHER THE CRACKED THREADS WERE THE CAUSE OF THE EXPLOSION OR WERE AS A RESULT OF IT."
    }
  },
  "consequences": {
    "fatalities": 0,
    "injuries": 1,
    "commodity": null,
    "release": null,
    "propertyDamage": 90000,
    "estimatedOperatorCost": null,
    "estimatedEmergencyCost": null,
    "estimatedEnvironmentalCost": null,
    "ignition": null,
    "explosion": null,
    "evacuated": null,
    "raw": {
      "FAT": "0",
      "INJ": "1",
      "PRPTY": "90000"
    }
  },
  "provenance": {
    "viewId": "27nc-rsge",
    "viewUrl": "https://data.transportation.gov/api/views/27nc-rsge",
    "assetId": "7ccf83c5-a778-4c51-ba2d-a9a84e221c7b",
    "archiveFilename": "Gas Distribution Incident Data - mid 1984 to February 2004.zip",
    "archiveSha256": "faf20de4eb8fe04e84e6ec6704517de9f4f59755ba8dae865881822ffe5d336f",
    "memberPath": "incident_gas_distribution_mid1984_feb2004.txt",
    "memberSha256": "160b048435c0ab62f776d36b69451902e8337a5cdaa7d28aa5247166783cfe65",
    "rowNumber": 850,
    "rowSha256": "aab964528c2bb9440a1ce2b20da4269eeeaa3f0d883b8e080e7fc39266725c8c"
  },
  "caveat": "Operator-reported incident data submitted to PHMSA, generally within 30 days. Records may be supplemented or corrected and do not represent final agency causal findings.",
  "operatorReported": true,
  "finalAgencyFinding": false,
  "flaggedAnalysis": {
    "dataAsOf": "2026-07-31",
    "flags": {
      "fireFirst": null,
      "significant": true,
      "serious": true
    },
    "standardizedCause": {
      "sevenCategory": "ALL OTHER CAUSES",
      "sevenSubcategory": "MISCELLANEOUS",
      "eightCategory": null,
      "eightSubcategory": null
    },
    "costs": {
      "reported": 90000,
      "in1984Dollars": 80699.693564862,
      "currentYearDollars": 198738.508682328
    },
    "caveat": "PHMSA trend flags, standardized causes, and indexed costs are analytical fields added to operator-reported incident data. They do not represent final agency causal findings.",
    "provenance": {
      "sourceUrl": "https://www.phmsa.dot.gov/sites/phmsa.dot.gov/files/data_statistics/pipeline/PHMSA_Pipeline_Safety_Flagged_Incidents.zip",
      "landingPageUrl": "https://www.phmsa.dot.gov/data-and-statistics/pipeline/pipeline-incident-flagged-files",
      "catalogUrl": "https://data.transportation.gov/Pipelines-and-Hazmat/Pipeline-Incident-Flagged-Files/qdme-9bbm",
      "retrievalMode": "official_live",
      "archivedAt": null,
      "archiveSha256": "317e6a3e16d60b9b677efe391dc40258b5dd7ead83fb8bea74cb553cedfbbdec",
      "workbook": "gd1986tofeb2004.xlsx",
      "sheet": "gd1986tofeb2004",
      "rowNumber": 444,
      "rowSha256": "333fc5a16c2818ff4d803fc4016da25288db740bcaa8e2866c4e19a69b736a16"
    }
  },
  "jurisdiction": "US",
  "operatorName": "COLUMBIA GAS OF OHIO INC"
}
```