Monday, May 16, 2011
Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News
by Craig Smith, The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review
When it comes to natural-gas fires, what lies beneath worries firefighters.
"It's what you can't see," said New Castle fire Chief Thomas A. Maciarello.
More than 50 firefighters from 16 Western Pennsylvania fire departments recently completed specialized training on battling natural-gas fires, such as the one that ignited in February at a Marcellus shale drilling site in Washington County.
"It's essential firefighters understand how to respond to a natural-gas fire because many times they are the first at the scene," said Carol Fox, president of Columbia Gas of Pennsylvania, which conducted the training at company facilities in Ellwood City in Lawrence County and Waynesburg in Greene County.
Fire departments don't often practice responding to such fires because they occur so infrequently, Maciarello and Mt. Lebanon fire Chief Nicholas Sohyda said.
"We have several gas transmission lines, underground vaults, brick gas houses, some near schools," Sohyda said. "It's not a high-frequency event. ... But there is the potential to have a little bit more significant incident."
The training "gives us an idea of what we can do," Maciarello said.
In addition to well fires, firefighters were trained in extinguishing fires caused by natural gas migrating to the surface; fires at an above-ground regulator station or meter; and fires in excavation pits.
Columbia Gas, with local headquarters in Canonsburg, serves about 400,000 customers in 26 counties. It is one of the 10 energy-distribution companies of NiSource Inc., which serves 3.8 million natural-gas and electric customers in nine states.
This fall, Columbia Gas will provide similar training to fire departments in eastern and central Pennsylvania.
Copyright (c) 2011, The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review
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