SPIRE GULF INC. — Gas transmission and gathering — incident on 2018-06-26

Gas transmission and gathering incident in CHICKASAW, MOBILE County, AL. Reported cause: OTHER OUTSIDE FORCE DAMAGE. Reported consequences: 0 fatalities, 0 injuries, 103 NATURAL GAS released, $240,365 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: 20180078.

Operator ID: 12642.

Reported incident date: 6/26/2018 13:39.

Location detail: 767+06

Cause detail: ELECTRICAL ARCING FROM OTHER EQUIPMENT OR FACILITY

Cause detail: AT THE STATED LOCATION, A DOWNED POWER LINE CAME IN CONTACT WITH THE VENT OF A 10" ENCASED STEEL PIPELINE CAUSING AN ELECTRICAL ARC INSIDE THE CASING AND A PINHOLE LEAK IN THE STEEL PIPELINE. THE LEAK RESULTED IN AN ABOVE-GROUND BRUSH FIRE THAT CAUSED NO ADDITIONAL DAMAGES. VALVES WERE CLOSED TO SHUT DOWN THE AFFECTED SECTION OF PIPELINE AND STOP THE RELEASE OF NATURAL GAS ON JUNE 26, 2018 AT 22:00. FINAL REPAIRS WERE COMPLETED ON DECEMBER 19, 2018. AN ADDITIONAL INVESTIGATION OF THE PIPE SEGMENT WAS PERFORMED AND IT CONFIRMED THAT A HIGH-VOLTAGE ELECTRICAL ARC INSIDE THE CASING WAS THE CAUSE OF THE LEAK. AT APPROXIMATELY 16:30 ON JUNE 26, 2018 , THE OPERATOR DETERMINED THAT THIS EVENT WOULD BE A REPORTABLE INCIDENT DUE TO ESTIMATING THE DAMAGE AND REPAIR COSTS TO EXCEED $50,000.

PHMSA trend classification: significant incident, not serious.

PHMSA standardized cause: OTHER OUTSIDE FORCE DAMAGE — ELECTRICAL ARCING.

PHMSA indexed costs: $297,571 reported total cost, $143,832.687 in 1984 dollars, $349,952.613 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.