Good day all. Two years ago, a gas main in Lawrence, Massachusetts blew up, destroying a number of homes, killing one person, and injuring a number of others. Last week, it was announced that the gas company was being kicked out of Massachusetts.
Now, considering my general political outlook, you would think I would be against the government forcing a private company to sell their assets and leave. In this case, you would be very very wrong. I’ll go into the why later on. Meanwhile, here are the details of what happened to the Columbia Gas Company from Fox News:
A Massachusetts gas company agreed on Wednesday to plead guilty to federal charges – and pay a $53 million fine – two years after gas lines burst, causing explosions and fires that killed one and injured dozens more. Columbia Gas of Massachusetts will plead guilty to violating the Pipeline Safety Act following a federal investigation into the September 2018 explosions, the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Boston tweeted.
For those of you who may not know, The Anger Central Primary Dwelling is only about 20 minutes away from where this all happened. I have friends in the industry who were called in to clean up the mess caused by Columbia Gas.
Under the terms of the plea agreement filed in court Wednesday, Columbia Gas will pay a $53 million fine, which is “double the amount of the profits of the pipeline replacement project that Columbia Gas was pursuing that caused the disaster in Lawrence and surrounding towns,” Douglas Shoemaker, the special agent in charge, said at the press conference.
“This is by far the largest criminal fine ever imposed under the Pipeline Safety Act,” he said.
This doesn’t include the civil judgments that have been or will be made against Columbia Gas and it’s parent company.
NiSource also has subsidiaries in Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Kentucky and Virginia. As per a separate agreement, it will implement the recommendations made by the national transportation safety board in the wake of the gas explosions in Massachusetts two years ago.
“Columbia Gas, through a pattern of flagrant indifference, in the face of extreme risk to life and property, knowingly violated minimum safety standards for starting up and shutting down gas pipelines,” Shoemaker said.
That is a nice way of saying incredible incompetence and utter stupidity. According to my sources, (Yes, I actually do have sources for this story), the gas company was performing some work on the lines. Normally, the pressure in the lines is kept very low. I don’t recall the exact level, but it I believe it is less then one pound per square inch. (I may be off a bit) This is sufficient to get the gas into the homes that are served.
One of the things that the gas companies use is a device that sends the gas pressure levels back to the main office. Computers then regulate the levels to keep the pressure within a standard range. This is where the stupidity and incompetence comes in. The engineer who planned out the maintenance schedule was not in Massachusetts. He wasn’t even in the North East. He never came on site and never actually saw the infrastructure. In his/her planning, he/she forgot to include the safety device.
When the local gas workers did their work, they didn’t put the safety device back into place. Why? It wasn’t on the project plan. When the gas started flowing, the computers couldn’t get a reading so the program believed that the pressure was to low to measure and the computers started pumping in more gas. I have been told that the lines had upwards of 90 pounds per square inch when they ruptured, and were pushing that level into the homes in the area. The lines inside the homes overloaded and KABOOM!
The explosions and fires in the Merrimack Valley communities of Lawrence, Andover and North Andover injured about 25 people. Leonel Rondon, 18, died when a chimney collapsed on his vehicle in the driveway of a friend’s home. He had gotten his driver’s license just hours earlier. Columbia Gas reportedly has already reached an undisclosed settlement with his family, according to Mass Live.
I hope it was in the 7-8 figures.
Five homes exploded and 125 structures were damaged by fires that sparked in the area, the Globe reported. Thousands of homes and businesses were left without heat or water for weeks during the onset of cold weather in New England before the winter months.
It was not a fun time, let me tell you. As I mentioned, I have one friend who works for a competitor, and once Massachusetts found out just how badly Columbia Gas and it’s parent company screwed up, they ordered them off the repairs and called in the competition to clean up the mess.
Last summer, my gas company came in and replaced all the pipes in the neighborhood, including the feeders into the houses. This included mine. I stayed home from my Real World Job to let them into the Anger Central Primary Dwelling. I chatted with team lead and he was the one who told me about the pressure levels. (He and his crew were called in to help replace the damaged lines)
Now you know why I am not upset at a progressive totalitarian government, in this case the moonbats running Massachusetts, telling a company to get the Hell out. The incompetence shown killed someone and caused millions of dollars in damage. Honestly, I wouldn’t have a problem with the holding company being forcibly broken up and sold off. This is one of those extremely rare, once in a blue moon situations where you really won’t find many people of any political position being upset at this outcome.
Thatisall
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