HILCORP ALASKA, LLC — Gas transmission and gathering — incident on 2019-04-27

Gas transmission and gathering incident in Not Within a Municipality, KENAI PENINSULA BOROUGH County, AK. Reported cause: CORROSION FAILURE. Reported consequences: 0 fatalities, 0 injuries, 1.6 NATURAL GAS released, $1,500,000 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: 20190062.

Operator ID: 32645.

Reported incident date: 4/27/2019 19:30.

Location detail: MILE 4.48

Cause detail: EXTERNAL CORROSION

Cause detail: DIVERS WERE CONDUCTING TACTILE INSPECTIONS OF A METAL LOSS ANOMALY IDENTIFIED BY A 2017 ILI WHEN THE DIVE BOAT NOTICED SMALL BUBBLES AT THE WATER SURFACE. UPON INVESTIGATION, DIVERS FOUND BUBBLES EMANATING FROM THE TOP OF THE PIPELINE NEAR A GIRTH WELD, LOCATED APPROXIMATELY FIVE FEET AWAY FROM THE ILI ANOMALY. PRODUCTION ON THE PLATFORM WAS SHUT-IN AND PIPELINE PRESSURE WAS REDUCED TO LIMIT THE LEAK TO THE FULLEST EXTENT WHILE MAINTAINING POSITIVE PRESSURE INSIDE THE PIPELINE. DIVERS BEGAN REPAIR ACTIVITIES, AND COMPLETED INSTALLATION OF A TEMPORARY CLAMP TO STOP THE LEAK WITHIN 24 HOURS OF DISCOVERY. THE INSTALLATION OF THE PERMANENT CLAMP TO REPAIR THE PIPELINE WAS COMPLETED ON MAY 24. HILCORP ALASKA SELECTED THE ONSHORE PIPELINE CLASSIFICATION IN PART B OF THIS REPORT. HOWEVER, HILCORP ALASKA AND PHMSA ARE CURRENTLY IN DISCUSSIONS REGARDING THE APPROPRIATE STATUS OF THE PIPELINE (ONSHORE VERSUS OFFSHORE).

PHMSA trend classification: significant incident, not serious.

PHMSA standardized cause: CORROSION — EXTERNAL.

PHMSA indexed costs: $1,500,050 reported total cost, $702,880.767 in 1984 dollars, $1,730,914.996 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.