TENNESSEE GAS PIPELINE COMPANY — Gas transmission and gathering — incident on 2019-01-31

Gas transmission and gathering incident in CUMBERLAND, GUERNSEY County, OH. Reported cause: NATURAL FORCE DAMAGE. Reported consequences: 0 fatalities, 0 injuries, 55924 NATURAL GAS released, $300 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: 20190022.

Operator ID: 19160.

Reported incident date: 1/31/2019 2:08.

Location detail: 12

Cause detail: TEMPERATURE

Cause detail: ON JANUARY 31, 2019 AT 2:08AM, TENNESSEE GAS PIPELINE COMPRESSOR STATION 209 IN CUMBERLAND, OHIO EXPERIENCED AN EMERGENCY SHUTDOWN (ESD). THE ON DUTY OPERATOR NOTICED THAT THE STATION CONTINUED TO BLOW DOWN BEYOND DURATION OF A NORMAL SHUTDOWN AND CALLED THE OPERATIONS SUPERVISOR AND STATION PERSONNEL FOR ASSISTANCE IN LOCATING THE SOURCE OF THE CONTINUAL GAS RELEASE. THE OPERATIONS SUPERVISOR ARRIVED ON SITE AND TOGETHER WITH THE OPERATOR AND STATION PERSONNEL IDENTIFIED THAT THE STATION HEADER SUCTION VALVE, AS-1, AND DISCHARGE VALVE, AD-3, HAD NOT CLOSED AS DESIGNED. THE OPERATOR AND THE OPERATIONS PERSONNEL (OPERATIONS SPECIALIST) MANUALLY CLOSED THE SUCTION AND DISCHARGE VALVES AND STOPPED THE GAS RELEASE AT 2:45AM ON JANUARY 31, 2019. THE STATION VENTED FOR A TOTAL OF 37 MINUTES AND THE TOTAL GAS RELEASE WAS 55,924 MCF. THE INVESTIGATION REVEALED THAT ESD PUSH BUTTON 5 HAD HAD MOISTURE ENTER THE CASING AND CAUSED CORROSION ON THE BUTTON. ON THE DAY OF THIS EVENT, THE EXTREMELY COLD TEMPERATURES (-4 DEGREES FAHRENHEIT) CAUSED THE MOISTURE IN THE CASING TO FREEZE THEREFORE OPENING THE CIRCUIT ON THE BUTTON AND INITIATING THE ESD. IN ADDITION, MOISTURE HAD GOTTEN IN TO THE AS-1 SUCTION VALVE ACTUATOR AND AD-3 DISCHARGE VALVE ACTUATOR AND THE EXTREMELY COLD WEATHER CAUSED THE VALVE O-RINGS TO FREEZE, PREVENTING THEM FROM CLOSING. IN ORDER TO PREVENT A REOCCURRENCE OF THESE EVENTS THE PUSH BUTTON WAS REPLACED AND FRYQUEL 300 WAS ADDED TO THE VALVE ACTUATORS ON AS-1 AND AD-3 TO ENSURE THEY ARE SEALING TIGHTLY AND WATERTIGHT. A 48-HOUR PHONE CALL UPDATE WAS MADE TO THE NRC. THE 48-HOUR REPORT NUMBER IS 1236569. THE "ORIGINAL" REPORT WAS INTENDED TO BE MARKED AS "ORIGINAL/FINAL" BUT THE "FINAL" DESIGNATION WAS INADVERTENTLY NOT MARKED. NO NEW INFORMATION HAS BEEN ADDED TO THIS "SUPPLEMENTAL/FINAL" REPORT.

PHMSA trend classification: significant incident, not serious.

PHMSA standardized cause: NATURAL FORCE DAMAGE — TEMPERATURE.

PHMSA indexed costs: $150,800 reported total cost, $155,886.653 in 1984 dollars, $191,868.003 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.