Cause of gas explosion in Ellsworth County in central Kansas unknown, official says

Northern Natural Gas, which had a gas leak near Lyons in Rice County last week, had a gas explosion in the county to the north on Thursday.

Last week’s leak was a storage well, which ruptured while maintenance was being done, sending natural gas and water molecules to shoot into the sky. This time it was in rural Ellsworth County, on one of the multiple gas lines that run from Texas to the upper Midwest, according to spokesperson JoAnna DeWald.

“There is no risk of this type of leak in any town that we know of,” she said. “This was an isolated incident, we shut off the section of pipe that was impacted and we don’t expect any issues.”

The rupture was reported at 1:30 p.m. and the fire was extinguished at 3:20 p.m. No one was injured.

“The gas has been shut off to the location that requires repair,” she said.

Ellsworth County emergency manager Keith Haberer said it happened 10 to 15 miles north of the city of Ellsworth in a pasture. Initial first responders said the flames went 300 feet in the air, he said.

One person used a drone to catch video of the fire. The video can be seen at bit.ly/3Bvtxsx.

The National Weather Service in Wichita said on Twitter that a satellite registered the heat from the explosion at 260 degrees Fahrenheit.

The explosion is under investigation, DeWald said. “We don’t know the cause currently.” When asked if the incidents were related, she said: “Absolutely not.”

The leak in Rice County last week continued overnight before it was capped.

NNG spokesperson Mike Loeffler said a naturally occurring fog prevented a crew from capping the storage well the first day. Area resident Jacob Voorhies said it was a haze caused by the leak.

“I think everyone says certain things for lawyers,” he said. “I live a mile away and whenever you look across the street you could clearly see there was something in the air … I guarantee you walk around town and ask 80 people, all 80 people will say, ‘Yeah, there was something different last night.’”

Loeffler said measurements taken near the edge of Lyons didn’t detect any levels of sulfur or natural gas. About residents’ complaints of a smell, Loeffler said it is likely sulfur that forms in the Arbuckle Formation, where the well is located.

He said the levels of sulfur wouldn’t be harmful.

Local residents disagreed with that assessment almost immediately.

“It’s giving me a headache the smell is so bad,” one person said in a Lyons community Facebook group. “I can’t imagine how it’s like for those of u closer to it.”

One of Kansas’ most notable natural gas leaks happened in 2001 about 30 miles southeast of Lyons.

In that case, gas leaked from an underground salt cavern and flowed seven miles underground to Hutchinson, where it popped up through abandoned brine wells and exploded. The first explosion destroyed about half a block of downtown businesses and shattered glass for blocks around. Two people were taken to the hospital with minor injuries, The Hutchinson News reported.

A day later, gas found another path to the surface and exploded in a mobile home park in east Hutchinson, killing an elderly couple.

It took more than a month for flares to burn off the estimated 143 million cubic feet of gas that escaped from storage.

This story was originally published July 22, 2021 at 4:37 PM.