Major gas leak downtown forces evacuations and road closures
A construction crew on an LRT-related work site tore open a gas line on Tuesday afternoon, prompting the evacuation of at least five downtown buildings and snarling rush-hour traffic.
A loud hissing noise echoed through the downtown core for nearly three hours while Enbridge worked to shut off the gas line and firefighters emptied buildings surrounding the construction site on Queen Street just east of O’Connor Street. The scent of gas lingered in the air for blocks.
Ottawa Fire Services received a call for a “major gas leak” at 1:21 p.m. Firefighters expanded an evacuation zone to cover a fourblock radius in each direction. Police directed pedestrians away from the site and closed surrounding roads to traffic.
The leak had an immediate impact in the area bounded by Wellington, Elgin, Albert and O’Connor streets.
The closure of Albert Street between Elgin and O’Connor streets forced Transitway buses to take detours around the evacuation zone during the beginning of the afternoon rush hours.
Emergency services reported no injuries.
Deputy Fire Chief Kim Ayotte said the fire department’s job was to minimize the hazards by evacuating the area and keeping ignition sources away. Firefighters were monitoring the air quality at various locations around the evacuation zone.
“It’s only dangerous when we get into the flammable ranges of the gas and the gas reaches an ignition source. That’s why we evacuated people,” Ayotte said at a command post set up on O’Connor near Slater.
“The evacuation was very successful of the buildings. It was orderly and people got out of the buildings. We had no incidents and no injuries.”
The hissing noise stopped just after 4 p.m. when Enbridge workers shut off the gas. Life downtown slowly started to return to normal, although it took some time for traffic to flow smoothly again.
Ayotte said firefighters were going through buildings to make sure there weren’t pockets of gas before opening the doors to office workers and the public.
The creation of a large evacuation zone was a necessary safety measure, he said.
“We create large evacuation zones and we monitor the air quality,” Ayotte said. “I can assure you the air quality or the gas in the area was never in a range that was dangerous to anybody that was in any of those zones, and had it been, they would have been quickly moved out of those areas.”
Anthony Di Monte, the city’s general manager of emergency and protective services, said the concentration of gas in the open air wasn’t considered high enough to be worried about an explosion.
Queen Street is being reconstructed as a showcase corridor for the $2.1-billion Confederation Line LRT system. The work that caused the gas leak was related to the road renewal, but it’s part of the larger LRT project under construction by the Rideau Transit Group.
RTG spokeswoman Kathryn Keyes said the company believes it was an abandoned stub connected to a gas main that was hit. RTG was still investigating Tuesday night.
I can assure you the air quality or the gas in the area was never in a range that was dangerous to anybody.