Gas line break had Route 61 closed 33 hours

SAINT CLAIR — A break in a high-pressure natural gas line Tuesday morning, which prompted the closure of a stretch of Route 61 for more than a day, also triggered a response from the Schuylkill County Emergency Management Agency and local fire departments.

“Anytime you’re dealing with a natural gas leak, it’s a delicate situation,” said John Blickley, county emergency management director. “It’s definitely a major issue.”

After being closed for 33 hours, the north and southbound lanes of Route 61 were opened to traffic at 4:20 p.m. Wednesday, PennDOT spokesman Ronald J. Young Jr. said.

The incident, triggered when construction equipment nicked a gas line around 7:30 a.m. Tuesday, closed a key segment of one of Schuylkill County’s major traffic arteries.

The north-south Route 61 corridor, heavily used by commercial truck traffic, is the main link between Interstates 78 and 81.

John Mason, a UGI spokesman, confirmed late Wednesday afternoon that damage to the utility’s high-pressure natural gas line had been repaired.

While there was no explosion, Blickley said a potentially dangerous situation existed while crews undertook the delicate job of repairing the gas leak.

Blickley remained on-scene from around 8:30 a.m. Tuesday to 4:30 a.m. Wednesday, he said.

Scott Krater, the county’s 911 director, was also at the scene, along with fire companies from Saint Clair, Pottsville, Port Carbon and Schuylkill Haven.

The companies were equipped with specialized equipment used in fighting natural gas fires.

A natural gas line break, Blickley said, is classified as a hazardous materials, or hazmat, incident. Disaster emergency procedures require that it will be reported to state and federal agencies.

“One of the first things we did was to reach out to local school districts about the closing of Route 61,” Blickley said.

Shannon Brennan, director of Schuylkill Technology Center, said the Route 61 closure did affect the school, which has campuses in Frackville and Mar Lin.

“Our transportation department had to add additional time to re-route buses from southern Schuylkill County to reach the STC North Campus and we postponed a carnival for our Little Learners Pre-School Program to a later date due to the closure,” Shannon said via email.

Young said that in road projects the size of the Frackville Grade realignment, there is a designated detour route during emergencies.

The detour was Route 209 to Route 901 to Interstate 81, which basically channeled traffic through Minersville.

A Minersville Police Department officer said there were no major incidents due to the increase of traffic in the borough.

The northbound lanes of Route 61 were closed to traffic at the entrance to Coal Creek Commerce Center. Some of the traffic diverted onto Hancock Street in Saint Clair, circumventing the blockage via the Burma Road.

On Wednesday afternoon, traffic was light on the Burma Road.

A contractor working for PennDOT on the Frackville Grade project inadvertently damaged the gas line, Young said, but other details have not been provided.

Mason said natural gas service has been restored to the one UGI customer — Pottsville Materials — that was affected.

He had said Tuesday that the line feeds natural gas to hundreds of residential and commercial customers, and the time to repair the break took longer because UGI was trying to avoid disruption to other customers.

He had no information on the size of the break, except to say that a UGI crew that was on-site for a different project at the time was able to reduce pressure on the line.

The $115 million Frackville Grade project, the largest road construction PennDOT has ever undertaken in Schuylkill County, began in earnest this spring with excavation and other work along the 4.2-mile stretch from Terry Rich Boulevard in Saint Clair to the Interstate 81 interchange.