Personal Injury Lawyers > Personal Injury Blog > Explosions and Fires > Investigators Probe Sewer Link in San Bruno Gas Pipeline Explosion

Personal Injury Blog

Investigators Probe Sewer Link in San Bruno Gas Pipeline Explosion

Investigators including the National Transportation Safety Board are specifically looking at whether repair work on a sewer pipeline close to a gas transmission line was responsible for a deadly explosion that shook a San Bruno neighborhood last week.  According to the Los Angeles Times, the sewer that was repaired back in 2008, had been repaired in an unsafe fashion that possibly caused damage to pipelines in the area.

In 2008, San Bruno city replaced a sewer line near the gas transmission line that exploded last week.  When the sewer line was replaced, the risks of pipes in the vicinity was also increased.  The city also made use of a method called pipe bursting, which has been proved to increase the risk of damage to nearby pipes.  Back in 2001, a study conducted by the U.S. Army Corp of Engineers, confirmed that using the pipe burst method could disturb soil, and potentially cause damage to pipes nearby.  Pacific Gas and Electric the company that owns the pipeline that exploded, says it inspected the pipeline before and after the sewer work was completed.

The National Transportation Safety Board is not confirming that sewer work could have increased the risk of an explosion, but the agency is also looking at this critical angle as it continues its investigation.

Besides, Pacific Gas and Electric is finding itself in the position of having to provide answers about why important and necessary repairs were not conducted to a certain section of the gas pipeline that exploded in San Bruno.  For instance, according to the Los Angeles Times, in 2007, Pacific Gas and Electric received permission to spend $5 million of taxpayer money for the replacement of a high risk section of the pipeline.  However, the placement work was never performed.  This year, the company asked for another $5 million to perform the exact same work.  What is really concerning to California personal injury lawyers is that at no point in the process did the California Public Utilities Commission find it necessary to ask what Pacific Gas and Electric did with the $5 million it had taken earlier for replacement work that it never performed.

Excavation is one of the biggest causes of gas transmission failures and explosions in the United States.  In fact, it has been a major factor in several failures over the past couple of decades.  Over the past 20 years, more than 1 in 5 failures and explosions have been traced to excavation.  It plays a bigger role in gas pipeline failure than shoddy quality of materials.

The pipeline explosion tore through a San Bruno neighborhood last week, killing four people and injuring several others.  At least three people continue to be missing and are presumed dead.  It shouldn’t take a major disaster like this for California authorities to wake up to the fact that regulatory agencies have been lax in oversight of utility companies.

The Reeves Law Group is a law firm with offices throughout California dedicated exclusively to the representation of personal injury victims, including victims of explosions and fires. Please visit our website at trlglaw.com. If you desire a free consultation on a personal injury matter, please call us at (800) 644-8000 or email us.

The Reeves Law Group is not representing any party in the matters discussed in this posting.

---