Upper Arlington, OH – A new report released from the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio is shedding new light on a natural gas explosion that leveled an Upper Arlington homem and caused $9 million in damages to others.
The report says that a natural gas line installed in 1960 along Sunningdale Way was taken out of service between 1985 and 1997. Problem is, investigators say Columbia Gas failed to seal off that old, idle service line.
The report goes on to say that on March 20th, 2015 a Columbus water worker thought he was shutting off water service to the home located at 3418 Sunningdale Way. But instead, he was turning the valve on the old line which had been mismarked as a water line that lies near the same area.
While the worker later tried to later shut off the old line, it never sealed. PUCO investigators say that left traces of the natural gas to leak into the home for nearly 30 hours, which resulted in an explosion that leveled the home. The report says the owners of the home were preparing to have the water shut off in order to make plumbing repairs to the home while the family was out of the country.
Shana Eiselstein, with Columbia Gas of Ohio, said “Prior to 2008, we didn’t do work on customer service lines and again, we don’t have record of that work being done at the home. The record we had was for the original service line that was discontinued at some point.”
While a few neighbors have been able to move back in, other homes remain unsafe and are still boarded up. No one was hurt in the explosion.