Fire Chief Explains Gas Leak That Shut West Nine Mile

All's clear after a gas line rupture Wednesday that temporarily closed a portion of West Nine Mile Road in Ferndale.

Fire Chief Kevin Sullivan said a crew working on the "How the West was One" reconstruction project along West Nine Mile Road ruptured a two-inch feed to Quality Car Wash shortly after 9 a.m.

"A construction crew for the Nine Mile renovation was sawing cement and sawed right through the gas line," he said Thursday.

Sullivan explained gas lines are supposed to be buried 18 inches or deeper, but sometimes shift closer to the surface over time.

"It's not much different from something buoyant in water – gas lines can float up through the ground," he said. "Even though they're doing everything right, there's no way to know over the years what's moved."

Sullivan added that MISS DIG System, Inc., an excavation safety and utility damage-prevention company, was on-site and all gas lines had been marked before construction began.

Traffic along West Nine Mile Road between Pinecrest and Livernois was rerouted for approximately two hours Wednesday out of an abundance of caution while Consumers Energy shut off the gas and repaired the leak, Sullivan said.

He added that the gas leak was an "open" gas leak, meaning it was not trapped underground or in the pipe, which potentially could have created a the conditions for an explosion.

"An open gas leak is the best kind of gas leak," he said.

Natural gas is naturally odorless, but utility companies add a noxious odor to warn people when a leak occurs, Sullivan said, adding people downwind from the leak may have smelled it Wednesday.

Ferndale resident Megan Frye was among those who smelled the leak.

"It was freaky yesterday hearing the hissing and smelling the gas – especially after what happened in Royal Oak a few months back," when a home exploded, killing a man inside, following a gas leak, she said.

Sullivan said it is not out of the question that another leak similar to the one Wednesday in Ferndale could occur during the rest of the "How the West was One" project. 

"These things happen with construction," he said.