Oakhurst Residents/Schools Without Natural Gas Service This Morning
Decatur Metro | March 26, 2009 | 7:03 amThe AJC reports on the 1,500 DeKalb County residents without natural gas service this morning due to pressure drops at a regulator station down by Memorial and Candler Rd..
Amanda writes in and says many Oakhurst residents are among those affected…
Gas is still out in Oakhurst and likely will be for a while since they have to come back around and turn it back on at each house, and they want you to be home for that.
UPDATE: CSDMom reports that Oakhurst, Renfroe and College Heights schools are also operating as usual without gas this morning.
UPDATE II: Asst. City Manager Lyn Menne sends this update….
Tony Parker, Assistant City Manager for Emergency Management, reports that Atlanta Gas Light has 40 crew members working to turn off gas in all homes and businesses affected by the gas outage. Assuring that gas has been turned off at each location is an important safety measure to prevent buildings from filling with gas when gas service is restored. Atlanta Gas Light expects to have this work completed by noon today and can then make the repairs necessary to the piping system and restore gas service to the area.
Once gas service is restored, Atlanta Gas Light crews must go to each individual home and business to turn on individual service and make certain that pilot lights and other gas appliances are working properly. This service can only be performed by Atlanta Gas Light personnel and is done to assure the safety of all gas customers. Atlanta Gas light reports that repairs will be finished later this afternoon and that crews will be dispatched beginning around 4 p.m. to start turning on individual gas service. However, they believe it could take between 24 and 48 hours to visit each of the 1700 customers that have been impacted. For updates and additional information, you can visit the Atlanta Gas Light web page by following this link http://www.aglc.com/DecaturCandlerRdAreaOutage.aspx
I have gotten word that three CSD schools (Oakhurst, Renfroe, and College Heights) as well as Agnes Scott are all affected by this situation and currently do not have gas service (and therefore heat). All schools are open.
Not without power–without gas. The schools apparently do not have heat.
Tony Parker, Assistant City Manager for Emergency Management, reports that Atlanta Gas Light has 40 crew members working to turn off gas in all homes and businesses affected by the gas outage. Assuring that gas has been turned off at each location is an important safety measure to prevent buildings from filling with gas when gas service is restored. Atlanta Gas Light expects to have this work completed by noon today and can then make the repairs necessary to the piping system and restore gas service to the area. Once gas service is restored, Atlanta Gas Light crews must go to each individual home and business to turn on individual service and make certain that pilot lights and other gas appliances are working properly. This service can only be performed by Atlanta Gas Light personnel and is done to assure the safety of all gas customers. Atlanta Gas light reports that repairs will be finished later this afternoon and that crews will be dispatched beginning around 4 p.m. to start turning on individual gas service. However, they believe it could take between 24 and 48 hours to visit each of the 1700 customers that have been impacted. For updates and additional information, you can visit the Atlanta Gas Light web page by following this link http://www.aglc.com/DecaturCandlerRdAreaOutage.aspx
No hot shower this morning…
I have a dog with plenty of natural gas for anyone who needs it.
Oh Dad!
I’m a recent transplant to Decatur. Is this par for the course for utility service in the ATL metro area? I’ve seen better infrastructure in Central America. Thank God for the East Lake YMCA’s hot showers.
Seriously, it would take a natural disaster for something like this to happen on the rest of the East Coast.
Is this par for the course for utility service in the ATL metro area? I’ve seen better infrastructure in Central America.
Sadly, yes.
Par for the course? Of course! I have been without power too many times to count (at least 3X each summer) and have had unpotable water at least four times in the last two years. This no gas is a first in my tenure here. Living without modern utilities for a couple of hours or days is always an enlightening experience.
I have lived in Decatur most of my life and never had “repeated power failures”. What has happens occasionally in the summer is that lightening takes out a transformer and it is usually fixed within a couple of hours. I find these last few posts offensive, ignorant and backward beyond belief.
Frankly, I am little tired of transplants acting as if the South was a village full of rubes. If you don’t like what you find here, go home. We’ll get along just fine without you.
I mean “happened occasionally” , as I am sure I will get stereotyped for lack of subject-verb agreement.
Sorry, Scarlett, your reflexive Yankee(!) accusations won’t fly with me. I’m from the backwaters of another southeastern state. Shoot, my people think of Atlantans us annoying urbanites, verging on Yankification. I’m sorry to inform you, but your southern birthright has been polluted and you may no longer use it to call for the expulsion of high-falootin’ infidels.
Speaking from first-hand experience, I can tell you: the hick burg I’m from doesn’t just have random multi-day utility outages. Water mains don’t break during average rain events and highways don’t spiral meaninglessly into vortices of critical mass.
All that being said, I really like it here. I’m just annoyed by the inconvenience of this gas outage.
Frankly, I am little tired of transplants acting as if the South was a village full of rubes. If you don’t like what you find here, go home. We’ll get along just fine without you.
Have to agree with the above. I was born and raised in the South in what is considered a much less enlightened place than Metro Atlanta and we’ve never had the utility problems that we have here. Remember being without any running water (hot or wet) last year?
Steve, the problem is not with the workers who do an extrodinary job with what they have to work with. It’s the outdated and overtaxed infrastructure that is the problem.
Whoa, Nellie!
Each time this happens, I freak out, get mad and then get some perspective. There are people in this world that don’t have any hope ever of having access to the modern utilities we easily take for granted everywhere in this country (some of those people even live in this country). I take opportunities like these to step back and be grateful. I took an Arctic shower this morning, my son filthy and I am cooking Methodist chicken as my stovetop is down and my grill outside is soaked.
But let me be clear, I am from the South. I was college-educated in the South and I have lived in three major cities in the South. Right out of college, I lived in the North and chose to move back after a few years. In my experience, I do not consider Atlanta backward.
My post was not offensive nor based on ignorance. When my power is out for three hours or more I classify that as the ‘power is out.’ And literally, I have had my water service interrupted four times and been told to boil for more than an overnight. So get let that giant chip on your shoulder fall off and be gone with the wind. My post was based on my personal facts of living here not on some passive aggressive way to malign ‘the South.’
Sorry guys. I got defensive and was feeling a little protective! Forgive?
Absolutely, Nellie and thanks for post. Really though, a pressure drop? Is the Clash secretly behind running all the utilities in this area or is that just the blanket excuse everyone gives when there is a lapse in service?
I disagree with both of you.
When there are power problems, Georgia Power is extraordinary in their efforts to restore service under sometimes difficult circumstances.
There are hardly ever natural gas service problems and when there are, like the present situation, the provider naturally errs on the side of extreme caution since the consequences could be disastrous. If they didn’t take all the precautions and someone’s house blew up, I’ll bet that same someone would be the first one in court to sue the provider. AGL has have nearly 100 people in the field trying to contact every house and that takes time.
Ditto, I’ve lived in Decatur for 8 years and Atlanta for 5 more and this has never happened before. I’ve been very impressed at the number of people they have working to fix this. Have always been impressed with GA Power too and their speedy responses when we lose power.
G — Thanks for the Clash reference. Wrong ’em, boyo!