Backhoe Ruptures Gas Main; Nearly 1,000 Evacuated

A backhoe operator tore a hole in a natural-gas main Thursday in Pacific Beach, causing what one woman described as a “geyser of gas, dirt and rocks” and forcing the evacuation of nearly 1,000 people.

Renee Karr was working at the cashier stand in a service station at Garnet Avenue and Ingraham Street when she smelled gas and heard a loud hissing, then saw the debris spew upward.

“I pulled the switch that shuts off power to the gasoline pumps,” Karr said. “We got all our customers out of the station and just ran. . . . The construction workers ran, too; they were just as scared as everyone else.”

There were no serious injuries, police said.

Everett Langlais, a spokesman for San Diego Gas & Electric, said construction workers for Christeve Corp. were excavating about 9:30 a.m. on Ingraham between Garnet and Hornblend Street when the backhoe operator hooked a 1 1/2-inch steel stub that was sticking out of the 6-inch gas main. When the stub was torn off, the highly pressurized gas burst through.

The explosion threw a rock into a police car that was stopped at a nearby red light, Sgt. Hal D. Sutton of the San Diego Police Department said.

About 35 police officers and 50 firefighters worked to block off streets and evacuate buildings within a block of Ingraham, police said. More than 100 people were evacuated from nearby houses and apartments, and 815 students were taken from Pacific Beach Middle School. The evacuees returned an hour later, officials said.

Langlais said SDG&E; workers attached a clamp to the main in an attempt to close the hole, but the pipe cracked, and workers instead shut off gas in a five-block area.

The main was repaired early Thursday evening, and SDG&E; crews were working to restore service to the area.

The construction workers were replacing sewage lines as part of a sewer- and water-pipe replacement program in Pacific Beach, said Dave Allen, district engineer for the city of San Diego. Fire Department officials said the ruptured pipe was marked as a gas main.

Workers for Christeve Corp. declined to be interviewed. Officials of the company, based in Arcadia, could not be reached for comment.