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Clean Hydrogen Partnership

Release of hydrocarbons from a pipeline

Event

Event ID
665
Quality
Description

A leak of a flammable mixture of hydrocarbons and hydrogen from a ruptured pipeline caused an explosion and fire, killing one person and injuring forty six. Investigations into the incident found that emergency procedures were not followed.

Event Initiating system
Classification of the physical effects
Hydrogen Release and Ignition
Nature of the consequences
Macro-region
North America
Country
United States
Date
Component involved
pipe (generic)
Failure mode
rupture & ignition
Initiating cause
material degradation (generic)
Root CAUSE analysis

The INITIATING CAUSE was the rupture of a pipeline releasing a mixture of hydrocarbon and hydrogen, for unreported cause.

The ROOT CAUSE could be attributed to failure in following the existing procedures.

Root causes
Date entry in HIAD
01/01/2020

Facility

Application
Petrochemical industry
Sub-application
Pipeline
Hydrogen supply chain stage
All components affected

Pipeline

Location type
Unknown
Location
industrial area
Operational condition

Emergency & Consequences

Number of fatalities
1
Number of injured persons
46
Post-event summary

One fatality and forty six injured persons.

In-depth data

Release type
Gas-liquid mixture
Involved substances (% vol)
H2,
hydrocarbons
Probable IGNITION SOURCE
Explosion type

References

Sources categories
ICHEME
Reference & weblink

Event nr 11496 of the UK database ICHEME in PDF.

https://www.icheme.org/knowledge/safety-centre/resources/accident-data/
(accessed October 2020)

The primary source was in CHEMICAL HAZARDS IN INDUSTRY, JUNE 1999 which is no more available.