Enbridge hopes to have the balance of its customers impacted by Monday’s downtown natural gas line rupture back up and running by early evening today.
On Monday, road work downtown ruptured an Enbridge gas line near the intersection of Durham and Larch streets. Repairing the ruptured line requires the gas be shut off, said Enbridge spokesperson Leanne McNaughton, which meant about 134 customers in and around the downtown core lost service.
Getting everyone back up and running is a bit time consuming, McNaughton said.
“It’s not just like flipping a switch. We have to go in and ensure the pilot lights are on and everything is running safely,” she said.
This requires Enbridge workers to visit each customer individually to make sure the gas meter is operational, as well as checking all pilot lights. Each worker can visit about five customers an hour and Enbridge has brought in additional staff to speed things along.
As of this morning, about 40 per cent of customers were up and running, with the remaining 60 per cent expected to be reconnected over the course of today.
Several downtown restaurants were forced to close due to the situation. In a Sept. 19 Facebook post, Respect Is Burning apologized for customers for having to close and said it was one of about 100 businesses downtown that were impacted. The restaurant should be up and running today, the post states.
Mark Gentili is the editor of Sudbury.com.
