Appomattox County pipeline to return to service

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The company that operates three natural gas pipelines that run through Appomattox County is preparing to return one of those lines to full service Monday.

Williams Gas Company received approval Friday from the federal regulatory agency that governs pipeline safety to restore the first of its three pipelines to full service of 800 pounds per square inch.

Pressure on the line was reduced after a rupture and subsequent explosion in September of one of its neighboring lines produced a fireball that leveled two homes and injured five people.

The pressure will gradually be increased beginning Monday afternoon and will likely take a few days to reach its full operating pressure, said Christopher Stockton, spokesperson for the company. That line is currently operating at 640 psi.

“This is a slow, gradual process which is expected to last several days,” Stockton said. “We are confident that A line can be operated in a safe manner at its designed operating pressure.”

After a meeting last month in Appomattox, the federal agency decided to spend more time at the explosion site, performing a variety of leak tests and ensuring that anticorrosive measures were in place, said Patricia Klinger, spokesperson for the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration.

Klinger said investigators wanted to be sure that the steps outlined in a Corrective Action Order issued in September, in the wake of the explosion, were completely followed.

“We wanted to make sure the data was coming back the way we wanted it to,” Klinger said. “We wanted to make sure everything was being handled properly.”

One of the pipelines that cross Virginia 26 just north of the town of Appomattox failed at before 8 a.m. on Sunday, Sept. 14. The natural gas it released blew into a fireball, scorching an area 1,125 feet in diameter, according to preliminary findings in the federal investigation.

Testing is still being done to determine what caused the line to fail, although a preliminary investigation showed some metal loss at the explosion site, according to a federal report.

The natural gas pipeline that runs through Appomattox is part of the Transco line, which extends from the Gulf of Mexico to New York, including 858 miles in Virginia.

The line that exploded still remains out of service while Williams’ officials make repairs. Stockton said the company hopes to bring that line back into service by January.

After excavating portions of that line, four places were found that needed repair.

The third pipeline is currently operating at reduced pressure. Stockton said the company plans to bring that line back to full service in early 2009.