TEXAS EASTERN TRANSMISSION LP (SPECTRA ENERGY CORP) — Gas transmission and gathering — incident on 2013-06-04

Gas transmission and gathering incident. Reported cause: CORROSION FAILURE. Reported consequences: 0 fatalities, 0 injuries, 6409 NATURAL GAS released, $787,000 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: 20130059.

Operator ID: 19235.

Reported incident date: 6/4/2013 13:00.

Cause detail: INTERNAL CORROSION

Cause detail: A SURFACE SHEEN WAS DISCOVERED IN EAST CAMERON 293 ON MAY 27, 2013 BY A PLATFORM OPERATOR. THIS INITIAL OBSERVATION WAS REPORTED AS A SURFACE SHEEN OF UNKNOWN ORIGIN BY THE ENVIRONMENTAL RESPONSE CONTRACTOR O'BRIEN TO THE NATIONAL RESPONSE CENTER (REPORT 1048450). SURFACE BUBBLES, A TYPICAL INDICATOR OF A NATURAL GAS PIPELINE LEAK, WERE NOT OBSERVED. AS A PRECAUTION, TEXAS EASTERN TRANSMISSION SHUT IN THE SEGMENT OF ITS PIPELINE NEAREST THE SHEEN ON MAY 27, 2013 UNTIL THE SOURCE OF THE SHEEN COULD BE DETERMINED. AFTER SHUT IN THERE WAS NO PRESSURE DROP THAT WOULD HAVE INDICATED A LEAK. TEXAS EASTERN TRANSMISSION DISPATCHED A DIVE BOAT MAY 28, 2013 TO THE SITE TO DETERMINE THE CAUSE OF THE SHEEN. DUE TO INCLEMENT CONDITIONS THE DIVE BOAT WAS UNABLE TO REACH THE LOCATION UNTIL JUNE 3, 2013. ONCE THE DIVERS ARRIVED ON LOCATION AND WERE ABLE TO DIVE, THEY DETERMINED THERE WAS A SMALL AMOUNT OF BUBBLES ORIGINATING FROM A PINHOLE LEAK DUE TO INTERNAL CORROSION ON TEXAS EASTERN TRANSMISSION, L.P. 16-INCH LINE 41-A-5 NATURAL GAS PIPELINE. THE METHOD OF REPAIR TO THE PIPELINE WAS INSTALLATION OF CLAMP.

PHMSA trend classification: significant incident, not serious.

PHMSA standardized cause: CORROSION — INTERNAL.

PHMSA indexed costs: $809,432 reported total cost, $425,220.685 in 1984 dollars, $1,024,766.552 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.