SOUTHERN STAR CENTRAL GAS PIPELINE, INC — Gas transmission and gathering — incident on 2018-12-10

Current as of 2018-12-10 Government source

Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety AdministrationOfficial agency material

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Gas transmission and gathering incident in Not Within a Municipality, CHEYENNE County, KS. Reported cause: EQUIPMENT FAILURE. Reported consequences: 0 fatalities, 0 injuries, 25100 NATURAL GAS released, $0 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: 20180131.

Operator ID: 31711.

Reported incident date: 12/10/2018 3:10.

Location detail: 160 / 4594+62

Cause detail: MALFUNCTION OF CONTROL/RELIEF EQUIPMENT

Cause detail: ON 12/10/2018 AT 3:10 AM LOCAL TIME, SOUTHERN STAR CENTRAL GAS PIPELINE (SSCGP) RECEIVED A HIGH LEVEL GAS DETECTION ALARM WHICH TRIGGERED AN AUTOMATIC EMERGENCY SHUTDOWN (ESD) OF THE ST. FRANCIS COMPRESSOR STATION IN CHEYENNE COUNTY, KANSAS. OPERATIONS PERSONNEL WERE DISPATCHED TO THE STATION ARRIVING AT 5:02 AM. AS PART OF THE ESD, THE STATION IS AUTOMATICALLY ISOLATED AND BLOWN DOWN. THE SCADA OPERATOR RECEIVED ALARMS THAT SSCGP LINE W WAS EXPERIENCING A RAPID DROP IN PRESSURE UPSTREAM OF THE STATION. THE UPSTREAM STATION ISOLATION VALVE FAILED TO FULLY CLOSE DURING THE ESD CAUSING MAINLINE GAS TO ESCAPE ALSO. ALL GAS WAS RELEASED THROUGH THE STATION BLOW-OFF VALVES. THE PERSONNEL ON SITE WARMED THE FROZEN ISOLATION VALVE AND HAD IT FULLY CLOSED BY 5:40 AM. A SMALL FITTING INSIDE OF THE STATION WAS LEAKING WHICH PROPERLY CAUSED THE ORIGINAL ESD. THIS FITTING WAS REPAIRED AND THE STATION WAS BROUGHT BACK ON-LINE AT 3:30 PM ON 12/10/2018.

PHMSA trend classification: significant incident, not serious.

PHMSA standardized cause: EQUIPMENT FAILURE — MALFUNCTION OF CONTROL/RELIEF EQUIPMENT.

PHMSA indexed costs: $100,380 reported total cost, $93,735.461 in 1984 dollars, $115,092.908 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.

This material provides agency context. It does not replace binding regulatory text, and its legal effect depends on the underlying authority and facts.