American Falls loses natural gas service
Approximately 1300 residential and business customers will be without natural gas service for most of Thursday. Intermountain Gas Company said service was unintentionally shut down in the community while maintenance work was being performed by Williams Pipeline Company, Wednesday. No industrial customers were affected.
Intermountain Gas Company spokesman Byron Defenbach stresses there was no gas leak. He said it appears workers had to close a valve for the maintenance work and failed to reopen it. As a result, all of the company’s American Falls gas connections will have to be individually closed before the system can be re-pressurized. At that time, a team of about 20 technicians will be working to re-open valves at each meter and re-lighting natural gas appliances.
Officials hope that work can be accomplished by 10 p.m., Thursday. Intermountain Gas personnel from across the state, including Boise, Nampa, Twin Falls, Hailey, Burley, Idaho Falls, and Pocatello have been dispatched to the American Falls area.
Williams Pipeline Company is an interstate company that delivers natural gas to the Intermountain Gas Company system.
American Falls Police Chief Brandon Wilkinson says emergency shelter and food service will be available to elderly residents and others in need during the temporary outage. Those in need should contact the Police Department at 208-226-5922.
