SOUTHERN STAR CENTRAL GAS PIPELINE, INC — Gas transmission and gathering — incident on 2011-12-07

Gas transmission and gathering incident in EMPORIA, LYONS County, KS. Reported cause: EQUIPMENT FAILURE. Reported consequences: 0 fatalities, 0 injuries, 1340 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: 20120002.

Operator ID: 31711.

Reported incident date: 12/7/2011 9:26.

Location detail: 140/46278.7

Cause detail: MALFUNCTION OF CONTROL/RELIEF EQUIPMENT

Cause detail: AT 09:26 AM THE GAS CONTROL ROOM RECEIVED A HIHI ALARM. A GAS CONTROLLER NOTIFIED A SOUTHERN STAR MEASUREMENT TECHNICIAN TO INVESTIGATE THE ISSUE AT 09:34 AM. AT 09:37 THE TECHNICIAN WAS CALLED AGAIN TO BE TOLD THAT THE EMERGENCY RESPONDERS WERE ON SITE AND RELIEF VALVE WAS BLOWING ON THE REGULATOR SETTING. SOUTHERN STAR'S TECHNICIAN TOOK 10 MINUTES TO ARRIVE AT THE SITE AND THE REGULATOR WAS SHUT IN WITHIN 30 MINUTES OF THE NOTIFICATION OF AN ISSUE. DURING THIS INCIDENT THE EMPORIA FIRE AND POLICE DEPARTMENT ALONG WITH THE SHERIFF'S DEPARTMENT HAD THE SOUTH PRAIRE ROAD BLOCKED FROM SOUTH AVENUE AND HAD EVACUATED APPROXIMATELY 25 RESIDENTS FROM THE AREA. THE INCIDENT WAS A RESULT OF THE REGULATOR NOT HOLDING AND THE RELIEF VALVE NOT FUNCTIONING AS DESIGNED. THE HIGH PRESSURE CAUSED THE RELIEF VALVE TO BLOW GAS FOR APPROXIMATELY 25 MINUTES. THE REGULATORS AND RELIEF VALVES WERE REBUILT AND FOUND TO CONTAIN OIL WHICH CAME FROM THE LINE. THE DOWNSTREAM LINES WERE WALKED WITH INSTRUMENTATION TO VERIFY THE LINES CONTAINED THE OVERPRESSURIZATION.

PHMSA trend classification: not significant, not serious.

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

PHMSA indexed costs: $4,806 reported total cost, $3,371.883 in 1984 dollars, $4,140.16 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.