Switched to Natural Gas Within the Last 5 Years? What You Need to Know Now!
If you or your neighbors switched to Natural Gas within the last 5 Years, your sewer line, home and safety could be at risk!
UGI Utilities Natural Gas & Electric invoices recently included a newsletter with an article titled “Clogged Sewer Line.” It warned homeowners that if their drains are clogged and need to be cleared by a professional, they need to make sure that they call 811 to check for buried electric or gas lines in the area prior to clearing the line.
The reason for their warning is that a natural gas line could have been unintentionally installed through your sewer pipe. The equipment used to unclog sewer pipes could damage that natural gas pipe, leading to the dangerous release of natural gas and potentially causing a safety hazard INSIDE YOUR HOME or YOUR neighbor’s home.
You see, the latest technique for installing a natural gas line from the street to your home is by boring the line through your yard – no traditional excavation, no backfill and very minimal re-landscaping required. That’s the good news.
The hazardous news is that we’re finding exactly what UGI warned their customers could happen — gas lines that run right through sewer lines, called a “cross bore,” that can eventually cause a sewer line backup or even the need for complete sewer line replacement! Typically, you wouldn’t be aware of this situation and would not smell “gas” because the boring process is stronger than the sewer line materials. If you ever smell “gas”, evacuate the area immediately and call UGI from a safe distance away.
When a sewer line backs up, it is an urgent problem and if not resolved could leak raw sewage into your yard. If during the clearing process, the gas line was to be damaged and require emergency gas line repairs — UGI then charges these repairs and replacement costs to the contractor and/or the homeowner. How is that fair when UGI damaged your sewer line?
Pronto Plumbing & Rooter is offering a FREE Sewer Line Camera Inspection to anyone in the Camp Hill, Mechanicsburg, Harrisburg or our other service areas in neighboring Pennsylvania counties who has converted to natural gas and the “boring” technique was used to have the gas line installed. Let’s catch this BEFORE it’s a problem AND an expense that rightly should belong to UGI!
If it isn’t discovered until you have a back-up, it may be too late to hold UGI responsible for any damage that they may have caused. Not only would you suffer the inconvenience of a sewer line back-up, and the danger of a gas line rupture – but you might also have to pay to repair the gas line that was bored through YOUR sewer line.
Be Safe – FREE Sewer Camera Inspection! Call 717-470-8201
