Gas line rupture forces evacuation of Bloomington buildings

A construction crew digging at the parking garage on the corner of Sixth and Morton streets ruptured a natural gas line Monday afternoon, forcing the evacuation of area businesses and the Monroe County Justice building.\nThe Bloomington Fire Department said there was little danger posed by the rupture but closed off the surrounding city block while workers scrambled to shut off the pipe. \nThe leaking gas sailed north and drifted into open windows at the Monroe County Justice Building down the street, causing nausea and dizziness to those in the building. Except for the 227 inmates, everyone inside was evacuated and went home early. \nIn the end though, the wind actually did more to control the situation, Vectren Energy Company supervisor Mel Williams said. Monday's stiff breeze quickly dissipated the leaking gas, defusing the potentially explosive situation.\n"Oh, we're glad for the weather," Williams said. "The wind helped more than anything." \nAn hour after the accident, Vectren workers had successfully blocked the leakage. \nFire Department Captain Tim Richards said the city block between Sixth and Seventh streets and Walnut and Morton streets was shut down mainly to keep repair workers safe from traffic. \nThe rupture, which was in a low-pressure line, would have been more worrisome if it had been high pressure, Richards said. \n"It wasn't that bad," Richards said. "It was outdoors, and it was a low pressure line." \nThe rupture disrupted local business for an hour, but owners didn't seem too bothered.\nFirefighters who went around to area businesses to check for gas accumulation forced the employees of Little Zagreb's Pizza to evacuate.\nManager Mark Conlin said he couldn't do prep work as a result. \nAnd owner of the Yellow Cab Company John McNeeley said, "It was an honest mistake."\nAt the nearby law office of Kelley, Belcher and Brown, bookkeeper Deena Anderson was preparing billing statements when she smelled gas coming in from an open window. When firefighters arrived, they told her she didn't have to leave, but she did anyway.\n"They said we weren't in danger," Anderson said. "One of our bosses told us to go home."\nWilliams said he could not comment on the amount of gas that leaked, the cost or whether the pipe was marked.\nBloomington Fire Department Captain Roger Kerr said the pipe was unmarked.\nBy 4 p.m. the Justice Building was unusually silent. The only person who stuck around was security guard Don Bennitt, who kept busy by telling confused people that the building was closed for the day. \nMonroe County resident Charles Bomgardner knocked on the locked door at 4:15 p.m., expecting to pay a small claims fine. \nBennitt told him everyone had gone home.\n"I work the rest of the week," a frustrated Bomgardner said. "It's going to be very difficult for me to come back."\nRuptured gas lines have become a common incident for Bloomington's Fire Department. This is the third since the beginning of the year, Batallian Chief Terry Williams said. \n"Gas is a scary thing," he said.