West Virginia gas pipeline explosion – just a drop in the disaster bucket

The fireball explosion Tuesday of an interstate natural gas transmission line in West Virginia, which left behind a huge jet of flame that burned for more an hour and melted four lanes of I-77, is just one of scores of accidents and explosions involving natural gas lines this year, federal data show.

Despite the magnitude of the explosion and fire, preliminary reports were that all persons were accounted for with no injuries, said a member of the National Transportation Safety Board, which is charged by Congress with investigating pipeline as well as airline, railroad and other transportation accidents.

An NTSB team was in Sissonville, W.V. at first light Wednesday, examining evidence at the accident site.

Robert Sumwalt, a safety board member, told reporters at an initial press briefing late Tuesday that the NTSB team would not speculate on causes of the explosion, but would collect evidence and interview witnesses, including the operators of the pipeline, Columbia Gas Transmission company, a subsidiary of Houston-based NiSource Gas Transmission and Storage.

But whatever cause eventually emerges, the dramatic event in Sissonville is set against a backdrop of several high profile natural gas accidents and a rapid increase nationally in gas pipeline mileage – even as federal oversight appears to lag.

"There are never enough inspectors at the state or federal level to adequately cover all the pipelines," says Rebecca Craven, program director at the Pipeline Safety Trust, a watchdog group based in Bellingham, Wash., that monitors energy pipelines of all types. "They can't physically spend enough time with each operator or pipeline to be able to do a thorough job and conduct regular inspections. They do what they can ­– enough to comply with their requirements."

The explosion at Sissonville adds to a previous tally of 80 small and large incidents this year involving just natural gas transmission lines, the big pipelines that ship huge quantities of gas from production areas to distribution hubs and population centers across the country, according to the Pipeline Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA), a branch of the US Department of Transportation that inspects and regulates the nation's pipelines.

Of the 80 incidents, 38 were classified as significant, PHMSA data show. The accidents and fires reportedly caused seven injuries, no fatalities, and $44 million of damage.

Added to this year's accident tally for gas transmission lines were another 71 incidents with nine fatalities and 21 injuries involving natural gas distribution lines, the much smaller gas lines under lower pressure that bring gas directly to residential and commercial customers in and around major population centers, the PHMSA data show.

The nation's energy transportation network includes more than 2.5 million miles of pipeline operated by about 3,000 companies of all sizes.         That includes 321,000 miles of onshore and   offshore “gas transmission and gathering” pipelines and another 2 million miles of gas distribution pipelines. Yet PHMSA has funding for only 137 inspectors, and often employs even less than that (in 2010 the agency had 110 inspectors on staff), ProPublica reported last month.

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