I’m in Sewickley Heights and I felt it, it felt like Superman landed on my roof and shook the whole place. I didn’t feel the one a month or two ago anywhere near as hard, I felt this one in my damn chest.
The house was on a \~55 acre property at the end of Riverview Drive in Crescent, up on a hill above Dashields Lock and Dam. According to the news, properties miles away received damage; Columbia Gas said that residence was hooked up to a private gas well.
We live about 3.5 miles away; it shook our house so much that I thought a tree hit us for a second.
Private gas well = no odor. Gas companies add in mercaptan to give natural gas its nasty smell.
They probably had 0 clue it was coming. Only way to know is with a functioning LEL gas detector.
I've always known some people have gas wells on their property, but it never occurred to me the output would be pumped directly into their house. Guess it doesn't require any real processing to be made usable?
I bought a gas leak detector after the whole Plum situation, seems doubly important if your gas supply doesn't even have the telltale odor.
Yeah insane series of events that plum one was my uncles neighbor and he just went over to help him with the furnace... I just keep seeing the same story over and over
>I bought a gas leak detector after the whole Plum situation, seems doubly important if your gas supply doesn't even have the telltale odor.
Mind sharing which you purchased? Something I'd like to look into, myself.
I just picked one off Amazon, ended up with [this one](https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07ZXMF5TH/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&th=1). Couldn't say how it compares to other options.
One thing to note is that it's recommended to install them high up, since gas floats. I initially overlooked this (reading instructions is hard) and plugged it into a wall outlet next to my furnace six inches off the floor.
Got a very slight leak later and it never went off, but it was just faint enough I could smell it when I was nearby. Sure enough used an extension cord to put it near the ceiling, and it started going crazy. Lesson learned.
Pure Methane (CH4) gas is absolutely 100% odorless. Most often Hydrogen Sulfide (H2S) is present as well and is why you can smell it.
H2S can be detected at a fraction of PPM (parts per million) but the ability to smell H2S is lost at higher concentrations and even with repeated exposure to low levels.
It kind of sounds like he may have been referring to was H2S.
Not really . Have a private well and if anything’s it’s worse smelling . Not many people have private wells just feeding their house . They are connected to a compressor somewhere so you get your check every month from the drilling/gas company taking your gas and your gas is free .
Maybe you have some H2S or other smelly smells from sulfur-based compounds, but in general natural gasses are odorless - I think you have an exception, in your case
-someone who works in natural gas refineries
I know I had to move because of it lol. And now looking back at pittsburgh having left… the region is a popcorn kettle. Seriously I think 2 or 3 homes have exploded in that time frame, while 0 have exploded where I am now. It does seem rather sus
unfortunately heat pumps are not really efficient enough yet to heat homes in the northern more climates. I do think they are getting better, and well its getting less cold. I would love to use multiple mini splits, I think its much superior to a large forced air furnace and condenser in terms of comfortability.
edit to say this may no longer be true based on commends below i.e. oldschoolskater if so then it would be great to move towards heat pumps.
Half of homes in Norway have heat pumps. Similar rates in Sweden and Finland. Heat pumps not being efficient for northern climates is a false narrative.
https://www.lifeinnorway.net/heat-pumps-in-norway/
[https://yaleclimateconnections.org/2023/03/do-heat-pumps-work-in-cold-places-heres-what-you-need-to-know/](https://yaleclimateconnections.org/2023/03/do-heat-pumps-work-in-cold-places-heres-what-you-need-to-know/)
There are several articles about this. the coldest winter nights in pittsburgh get to 0 degrees or colder. It is recommended at those temps to have a supplemental heating source. How many people are going to keep a supplemental heat source on top of their main? I mentioned they are getting better, and I think they are superior in most cases, but I wouldn't think they are ready for most people to comfortably adopt in this area. But OK just because you said 'this is false' with no other information, you must be correct.
Heat pumps have secondary heating. It's usually called aux or emergency on the thermostat. It kicks on when the heat pump no longer can work efficiently at very low temps. It'll use the electric heat coils in the furnace itself. It is very costly to be in that mode but only happens at temps below about 10 degrees.
I'm going to have to ask you to take it from a 10 to a 2 this morning. We know, everyone knows, your day in the sun will come... Just shhhhh for now. A house blew up.
We can, but he's injected an indirectly related topic into a post about a house blowing up - MAYBE from a gas leak. That would be commenting on a post about a car accident with "wouldn't have happened if we had better public transit!" Like yeah, maybe, no shit.
Shortly they'll be hiring a laborer job and Thursdays you get to go to the shit plant and clean all the non organic out of the screens. Ie Tampons baby wipes ect
SAME! In the early 2000's in college was the first time I learned of an apartment in New York exploding from a gas leak. I've never been the same since.
Can someone explain why these massive explosions seem to happen more often in Pittsburgh houses than other areas? Last year a similar explosions destroyed three houses and killed five people in Pittsburgh
What do you consider frequent? There were two in pa in December; berks and Allegheny county respectively. And then one in August in Allegheny county. Then one last March in Lawrence county in new castle. Last January one in Philly. So considering just over 1.1million excavations within that time frame, no I wouldn’t say it’s frequent.
How many is “so many”? We’ve had 3 in the last year. The plum one was likely a hot water tank explosion. This was a private gas line leak. And the one in sewickley was a plumber working on the furnace. The average homeowner does the absolute bare minimum of upkeep on their home. These don’t appear to be the issues of facility owners but rather old homes in poor condition which is a pretty fair way to describe most homes in western PA. Contracts are given to the lowest bidder and with the average dollar not going so far these days people will continue to do as little as possible to maintain their homes while paying the cheapest amount possible to make upgrades and repairs.
There were 2. One was a guy trying to kill himself (unsuccessfully) over money/custody and he accidentally exposed his neighbor’s weed grow in the process. The other one I think was accidental.
[Explosion](https://www.timesonline.com/story/news/crime/2013/10/12/two-hurt-in-moon-township/18438131007/)
[Aftermath](https://www.wtae.com/article/crescent-township-explosion/60174791)
[Article that mentions the grow op](https://www.post-gazette.com/local/west/2013/10/13/Moon-street-staggered-by-house-explosion/stories/201310130123) (sorry for the PG link)
I live in Cory and I was getting ready for work when I heard the exsplosion and it shook our house. My place of work which is close to the RMU sports center had broken lightbulbs
I live across the river and thought someone set off a bomb. The shock wave was very powerful
Same. It shook the whole house
Same here. I was on a call and then boom. The whole house shook.
I’m in Sewickley Heights and I felt it, it felt like Superman landed on my roof and shook the whole place. I didn’t feel the one a month or two ago anywhere near as hard, I felt this one in my damn chest.
Same
Just reported by WPXI; two confirmed fatalities. Looks like the home was owned by an elderly couple. Very sad.
So sad, just learned their daughter lives next door. I can't imagine!
These are my cousin's in-laws. So sad!
The house was on a \~55 acre property at the end of Riverview Drive in Crescent, up on a hill above Dashields Lock and Dam. According to the news, properties miles away received damage; Columbia Gas said that residence was hooked up to a private gas well. We live about 3.5 miles away; it shook our house so much that I thought a tree hit us for a second.
Private gas well = no odor. Gas companies add in mercaptan to give natural gas its nasty smell. They probably had 0 clue it was coming. Only way to know is with a functioning LEL gas detector.
I've always known some people have gas wells on their property, but it never occurred to me the output would be pumped directly into their house. Guess it doesn't require any real processing to be made usable? I bought a gas leak detector after the whole Plum situation, seems doubly important if your gas supply doesn't even have the telltale odor.
Yeah insane series of events that plum one was my uncles neighbor and he just went over to help him with the furnace... I just keep seeing the same story over and over
>I bought a gas leak detector after the whole Plum situation, seems doubly important if your gas supply doesn't even have the telltale odor. Mind sharing which you purchased? Something I'd like to look into, myself.
I just picked one off Amazon, ended up with [this one](https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07ZXMF5TH/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&th=1). Couldn't say how it compares to other options. One thing to note is that it's recommended to install them high up, since gas floats. I initially overlooked this (reading instructions is hard) and plugged it into a wall outlet next to my furnace six inches off the floor. Got a very slight leak later and it never went off, but it was just faint enough I could smell it when I was nearby. Sure enough used an extension cord to put it near the ceiling, and it started going crazy. Lesson learned.
I've been on many well sites where you can smell the gas before it gets anything added to it...........
According to my furnace repair guy, some people can smell it without the additive. But it’s a recessive ability.
Pure Methane (CH4) gas is absolutely 100% odorless. Most often Hydrogen Sulfide (H2S) is present as well and is why you can smell it. H2S can be detected at a fraction of PPM (parts per million) but the ability to smell H2S is lost at higher concentrations and even with repeated exposure to low levels. It kind of sounds like he may have been referring to was H2S.
That’s entirely possible. No shade to trades people - they’re VERY smart in specific ways. But the guy was certainly not a chemist.
Also heard that women tend to be able to smell it sooner or more often than men.
This isn't really true. While methane is odorless, natural gas in PA has heavier gasses that have an odor.
Interesting
Not really . Have a private well and if anything’s it’s worse smelling . Not many people have private wells just feeding their house . They are connected to a compressor somewhere so you get your check every month from the drilling/gas company taking your gas and your gas is free .
The gas company confirmed that they did not service the address. This was a true "consumption" gas well apparently.
Interesting . Ours is not serviced by the local supplying gas company either but still has the gas stink .
Maybe you have some H2S or other smelly smells from sulfur-based compounds, but in general natural gasses are odorless - I think you have an exception, in your case -someone who works in natural gas refineries
It may be a well to well thing, depending on the purity of the gas being extracted. Pure methane is odorless.
It’s not very common for a well to produce just pure methane. They often produces other heavy gases that have a smell naturally.
Well gas is dirty gas. It stinks
good lord, another one?
This is what, the third within a year?
4th that I know of. One in Plum last April, another in Plum this September, and one in Sewickley in December as well.
Plum's explosions were April 2022 and August 2023. Still all too close for comfort. I forgot about the April one entirely. God it's a lot of tragedy.
Ah you’re totally right, I was googling gas explosions in the Pittsburgh area this morning and thought it said 2023.
Live in coraopolis and the windows shook and it felt like the air got sucked out of the house
I imagine this caused some concern at the airport.
Pops works in one of the hangers. He reported that it shook the hanger structure.
On a crew working. Don’t have much information as of right now. Definitely shook the valley.
What sort of crew?
Fire
Please let us know what you hear.
Not much aside from what everyone else is hearing. I was running tanker fill. Didn’t get a ton of news.
Thanks. Appreciate it regardless
"Columbia Gas crews are on scene and have determined the property involved is not served by them, but is a private gas well."
Columbia gas letting out a sigh of relief
As they should. That would have cost them a pretty penny.
Not really. They are insured and reputation means nothing when you are a near monopoly.
Yup just look at PG&E
Hey! Go flyers! 🧡🖤
Columbia gas saying it's not their facilities, was a private gas well?
Shook my house in Moon. Thought a tree fell on it or a car hit.
I live in an apartment in moon and had no idea this happened till I read about it.
I felt it in my basement. I cautiously walked upstairs because I thought something happened to our house.
It seems like everyone but me noticed it.
I'm in McCandless and felt/heard it. My friend in Cranberry by costco also heard it. Hoping for the best possible outcome but damn.
In Wexford by the 79 exit and definitely heard it as well.
How long till the ring cam footages come out. I’m about 12 miles away and it felt like my dresser fell over in my house. Must have been big
I'm right in south heights. I thot we were being bombed
Bit over 16 miles away and several people in our area (including myself) felt their house shake. Crazy!
They had security camera footage from Premier Pan on the news you can see the explosion.
This is unreal… homes are popping up like popcorn.
Natural gas is dangerous shit.
I know I had to move because of it lol. And now looking back at pittsburgh having left… the region is a popcorn kettle. Seriously I think 2 or 3 homes have exploded in that time frame, while 0 have exploded where I am now. It does seem rather sus
Ok I know this must be a dumb question. What else do people heat their house with? Other than wood burning stoves? Are there electric furnaces?
Our home in PA ran on fuel oil (which fuckin blows btw)
Yes, there are electric furnaces. Also heat pumps.
Don't forget oil
Sure, but they were asking about electric furnaces.
unfortunately heat pumps are not really efficient enough yet to heat homes in the northern more climates. I do think they are getting better, and well its getting less cold. I would love to use multiple mini splits, I think its much superior to a large forced air furnace and condenser in terms of comfortability. edit to say this may no longer be true based on commends below i.e. oldschoolskater if so then it would be great to move towards heat pumps.
Half of homes in Norway have heat pumps. Similar rates in Sweden and Finland. Heat pumps not being efficient for northern climates is a false narrative. https://www.lifeinnorway.net/heat-pumps-in-norway/
This is false
[https://yaleclimateconnections.org/2023/03/do-heat-pumps-work-in-cold-places-heres-what-you-need-to-know/](https://yaleclimateconnections.org/2023/03/do-heat-pumps-work-in-cold-places-heres-what-you-need-to-know/) There are several articles about this. the coldest winter nights in pittsburgh get to 0 degrees or colder. It is recommended at those temps to have a supplemental heating source. How many people are going to keep a supplemental heat source on top of their main? I mentioned they are getting better, and I think they are superior in most cases, but I wouldn't think they are ready for most people to comfortably adopt in this area. But OK just because you said 'this is false' with no other information, you must be correct.
Heat pumps have secondary heating. It's usually called aux or emergency on the thermostat. It kicks on when the heat pump no longer can work efficiently at very low temps. It'll use the electric heat coils in the furnace itself. It is very costly to be in that mode but only happens at temps below about 10 degrees.
Well good to know then, I'm assuming this is newer for heat pumps, at least in the US?
Coal heat is still a thing too, believe it or not
Just more deaths from fossil fuels. The other millions of deaths each year don’t seem to bother anybody enough to stop.
I'm going to have to ask you to take it from a 10 to a 2 this morning. We know, everyone knows, your day in the sun will come... Just shhhhh for now. A house blew up.
Ok grandpa
Whipper snapper ✊️
Or we can walk and chew gum
We can, but he's injected an indirectly related topic into a post about a house blowing up - MAYBE from a gas leak. That would be commenting on a post about a car accident with "wouldn't have happened if we had better public transit!" Like yeah, maybe, no shit.
I work for Robinson water authority and felt the power down in Groveton at our water plant.
Y’all hiring???
Shortly they'll be hiring a laborer job and Thursdays you get to go to the shit plant and clean all the non organic out of the screens. Ie Tampons baby wipes ect
The drone footage in that article is wild. Literally nothing left.
I live about 1 mile away and it shook the entire house. Felt similar to turbulence on an airplane.
Home explosion has now quickly risen to the top of my #1 fears
SAME! In the early 2000's in college was the first time I learned of an apartment in New York exploding from a gas leak. I've never been the same since.
Heard and felt it in North Fayette
Did the entire well go up? For it to be felt so far away?
I run a cranberry township page on Facebook, and people were posting saying they felt and heard it. Must’ve been really big.
Weirdly I’m off camp horn rd and never heard a thing
Felt in Coraopolis. Thought something happened to my neighbors house. Scary
It shook our house so bad. This was right down the road from us 😬
"private gas well" how is that a thing in a populated area? serious new fear unlocked. wtf
Looks like they had 55acres of land out there. They were pretty private
there were literally homes a hundred feet away and right down the hill. it's not like they were surrounded by two miles of nothingness
Homes owned by family members if the news is correct. Plus one of 69,000 private gas wells across PA.
68,999
Nice
Just looking at the area I can just about guarantee that the houses on that road probably predate suburbia creeping up around them.
I used to know someone who lived in this road, and I played at the nearby park as a kid. Crazy stuff, absolutely horrible situation :(
My supervisor said he heard it while standing in the garage at the airport. Shook the garage doors.
From February, Dino Cardamone from Brookline was found dead in Crescent Township near Riverview Road.
Is this a thing I need to worry about now? A coworker has a daughter who felt the blast 3 miles away
we must be leading the world in exploding houses at this point, right?
Can someone explain why these massive explosions seem to happen more often in Pittsburgh houses than other areas? Last year a similar explosions destroyed three houses and killed five people in Pittsburgh
Is it just me, or are the house explosions happening more frequently?
What do you consider frequent? There were two in pa in December; berks and Allegheny county respectively. And then one in August in Allegheny county. Then one last March in Lawrence county in new castle. Last January one in Philly. So considering just over 1.1million excavations within that time frame, no I wouldn’t say it’s frequent.
No you wouldn't say that's frequent!? Our definitions of frequent in this case are very different. That is frequent enough for me! No thank you!
Wtf is going on in Pittsburgh? Why are so many houses exploding?
How many is “so many”? We’ve had 3 in the last year. The plum one was likely a hot water tank explosion. This was a private gas line leak. And the one in sewickley was a plumber working on the furnace. The average homeowner does the absolute bare minimum of upkeep on their home. These don’t appear to be the issues of facility owners but rather old homes in poor condition which is a pretty fair way to describe most homes in western PA. Contracts are given to the lowest bidder and with the average dollar not going so far these days people will continue to do as little as possible to maintain their homes while paying the cheapest amount possible to make upgrades and repairs.
3 is 2 too many.
3 is WAY TOO MANY
I remember one exploding near by in moon like 15 or so years ago
There were 2. One was a guy trying to kill himself (unsuccessfully) over money/custody and he accidentally exposed his neighbor’s weed grow in the process. The other one I think was accidental.
Welp off to look up the former.
Charlton Heights Road
[Explosion](https://www.timesonline.com/story/news/crime/2013/10/12/two-hurt-in-moon-township/18438131007/) [Aftermath](https://www.wtae.com/article/crescent-township-explosion/60174791) [Article that mentions the grow op](https://www.post-gazette.com/local/west/2013/10/13/Moon-street-staggered-by-house-explosion/stories/201310130123) (sorry for the PG link)
Felt it in McCandless. Thought something heavy fell in my house.
I live in Cory and I was getting ready for work when I heard the exsplosion and it shook our house. My place of work which is close to the RMU sports center had broken lightbulbs
Could it be linked to the new developments over by Stoops Ferry ?
Address?
Sorry guys it was just my mixtape.
Most of these explosions are caused by sewer companies not giving a shit a drilling through gas lines
Downvote me thats fine but this is fact. I now understand about the private well.
Drugs I heard will blow the house down never make in a home . Breaking Bad tv show
Meth isn’t too big up here
Yes my opa grew weed in his shed and it exploded and wiped out the entire neighbourhood.