EL PASO NATURAL GAS CO — Gas transmission and gathering — incident on 2013-06-15

Gas transmission and gathering incident in MESITA, CIBOLA County, NM. Reported cause: INCORRECT OPERATION. Reported consequences: 0 fatalities, 0 injuries, 29163 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: 20130062.

Operator ID: 4280.

Reported incident date: 6/15/2013 15:43.

Location detail: 300

Cause detail: VALVE LEFT OR PLACED IN WRONG POSITION, BUT NOT RESULTING IN AN OVERPRESSURE

Cause detail: AMBITROL COOLANT LEAKING FROM ENGINE COMPONENT ON TO TURBO CHARGER INSULATION RESULTED IN FLASH FIRE (BURNING COOLANT, NOT NATURAL GAS); UNIT WAS RUNNING AT THE TIME; FIRE EYE SAW FLASH FIRE; FULL STATION ESD OCCURRED; 30-INCH DISCHARGE VALVE DID NOT CLOSE THEREFORE ALLOWING NATURAL GAS RELEASE THROUGH VENT SYSTEM; INVESTIGATION FOUND CLOSED POWER GAS ISOLATION VALVE RENDERING 30-INCH DISCHARGE VALVE INOPERABLE; NOT AN EQUIPMENT FAILURE; INVESTIGATION COULD NOT DETERMINE REASON FOR ISOLATION VALVE TO BE CLOSED; FOLLOWING INITIAL INVESTIGATION, ALL BLOCK VALVES, VENT VALVES, AND POWER GAS VALES WERE CONFIRMED TO BE IN CORRECT OPERATING POSITION;

PHMSA trend classification: significant incident, not serious.

PHMSA standardized cause: INCORRECT OPERATION — INCORRECT VALVE POSITION.

PHMSA indexed costs: $89,978 reported total cost, $72,772.115 in 1984 dollars, $89,480.844 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.