Life first, property second

Black Hills Energy informs Saratoga Town Council of gas emergency protocols

In the past two years, Saratoga has experienced three significant gas events which have required the presence of emergency responders.

At the July 20 meeting of the Saratoga Town Council, representatives from Black Hills Energy were in attendance to explain their policy regarding emergency gas events. The most recent one was a gas meter strike in June of this year, which resulted in a shelter-in-place notification through Carbon County’s AlertSense program.

In November 2019, two gas leaks resulted in two evacuations. One leak, at a vacant lot across the street from Kum & Go, led to nearby residents evacuating for several hours. Another leak, this one at the Saratoga Elementary School, forced the evacuation of students and staff to the nearby Platte Valley Community Center.

Gary Hogan, manager of gas operations for Black Hills Energy, appeared before the council in 2019 and returned on July 20 to explain the gas company’s protocol when it comes to emergency gas events.

“As far as our emergency response protocols go, we have within the 60 minute guideline that’s set by PHMSA (Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration) that we need to be able to respond to gas emergencies. Here in Saratoga, we’re fortunate that we do have one of our service specialists that lives here in Saratoga. During the week, we’re well under 20 minutes on our response to get to gas leaks and line hits and fires and meter strikes and things like that,” said Hogan. “When we get into an on-call situation, he can’t be on-call every single night and so that rotation falls in with the Rawlins group. Normally that’s a five person rotation. We’re a head short right now and so it’s a four person rotation. Most of the time we’ll be responding from Rawlins, about 20 percent of the time we’ll be here after hours and weekends and things locally when our individual is on call.”

Hogan, who stated he had been in the industry for nearly 40 years, informed the council protocols had changed in how service specialists were able to respond to emergencies. While “it used to be nothing” to walk into the area with the gas leak and find a way to get the gas to stop blowing, both technology and attitudes had changed.

“(The) Industry has changed quite a bit and, since 1970, there’s been a downward trend in fatalities resulting from responders going into situations,” Hogan said. “Black Hills Energy is no different and we have adapted protocols that are similar to most utilities across the country.”

According to Hogan, the first responsibility of the service specialist is not to stop the gas leak. Instead, their first priority is to protect life and property second with financial considerations third on the list.

“In order to do that, what we ask from our emergency responders from the community is to help us do that. We don’t want them to hop into the hole and squeeze it off or pinch it off or anything like that. We’re just asking to keep the situation safe, help with evacuations, keep the public back and get people out of the situation,” said Hogan. “(If) someone goes into that situation and they’re overcome by gas or we do have an ignition of some kind and there’s an explosion, what was a relatively controlled situation now becomes a rescue operation or, even worse, a recovery operation and there’s nobody else that can come and help with it.”

While a service specialist may be first on scene from Black Hills Energy, the actual work to stop the leak would be performed by a maintenance crew which would be called out of Rawlins. Hogan said he understood Saratoga, like many other small communities, had a volunteer fire department and to have their presence at events such as a gas meter strike was quite a commitment to request.

“I’ll just reiterate some of the things you and I had discussed on the phone a few weeks ago. Our conversation was about responsibility. We voiced some frustration about response time. It helped me clarify who’s responsible to do what and what happens when there’s a hit,” said Councilmember Jon Nelson. “The key points are, for me anyway, Black Hills does not expect any of our emergency responders to fix the leak. There’s not an expectation there, it’s not our fire department’s responsibility to crimp or plug any lines. Like Gary said, the duties for our local responders—police and fire—would be to keep the area safe and help with an evacuation as needed.”

While Nelson had his concerns apparently addressed, Saratoga Volunteer Fire Department Chief Pat Walliser did not. Referencing the gas leak in the vacant lot on 1st Street, Walliser informed Hogan up to four service specialists had arrived before a call was made for a maintenance crew to stop the leak.

“What I would like to see is … when we have our dispatch center call you guys and say that there’s a gas leak, it’s probably going to be more than something that we can take a pipe wrench or a crescent wrench and shut off that one,” said Walliser. “I know it’s blowing product into the air and luckily we’ve been pretty fortunate and we’ve had some breeze the last couple times this has happened but I guess my biggest thing is if we can get the right people rolling initially … (it) would probably help speed up the process a little bit.”

Walliser added he was concerned about getting enough people to a call for a gas leak to establish a perimeter and potentially evacuate the area due to the response time from Black Hills Energy. In response, Hogan informed Walliser the determination of who would be sent to the leak was often based on how much information was provided by the dispatchers. Additionally, citing the gas leak referenced by Walliser, Hogan said the company had invested in a remote steel squeeze for each maintenance crew throughout their service area.

“Depending on the situation, we are prepared to shut Saratoga off,” said Hogan.

The Saratoga Town Council will have met on August 3. The next meeting of the Saratoga Town Council will be on August 17 at Saratoga Town Hall.

 

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