Smoking on Gas vid!

[TitanTim]

Last two days we've had the gas mains replaced in the street along with the supply pipes from the mains to each properties meter.

My meter is in a cupboard by the front door and initially they wanted to move it as they didn't think they would have a long enough supply pipe :roll: but I said no so they left it in situ. They pulled the new plastic piping up through the old metal pipes, however they hit some probs with some of the houses where the plastic pipe wouldn't pass through, to overcome this they simply dug peoples drives up as they went along to clear any blockages :? errrm there was a few disgruntled people as they didn't ask if ok to dig their drive up.

Once the pipes were done the meters needed to be reconnected, pressure and leak tested, this is what this chap is doing on my meter, uncap the mains pipe and reconnect the meter pipe, I'm guessing there would have been some gas escapement as the system was live when the mains pipe was uncapped. I could smell gas at the time in the house.

Can you spot what the chap is doing whilst testing :lol:

https://ring.com/share/905827724

Call me daft but I wouldn't have thought it was the most sensible thing to do?

Tim.

 

[Chris_D]

Christ on a bike! What a plonker.
I'm not 100% but I'm pretty sure that 'not smoking while servicing a gas mains' would be one of the more serious health&safety directives during his training and once on the job.
I'd be having a word with his super.

 

[TitanTim]

Christ on a bike! What a plonker.
I'm not 100% but I'm pretty sure that 'not smoking while servicing a gas mains' would be one of the more serious health&safety directives during his training and once on the job.
I'd be having a word with his super.

Part of me is thinking am I missing something and is it as dangerous as I think it is as he obviously doesn't think so. I could smell gas so surely that is not a sensible thing to be doing especially as he was doing a leak test. I can see the funny side in a way but also potentially putting his life and my home and life in jeopardy. How easily does gas ignite lol.

Tim.

 

[Chris_D]

Christ on a bike! What a plonker.
I'm not 100% but I'm pretty sure that 'not smoking while servicing a gas mains' would be one of the more serious health&safety directives during his training and once on the job.
I'd be having a word with his super.

Part of me is thinking am I missing something and is it as dangerous as I think it is as he obviously doesn't think so. I could smell gas so surely that is not a sensible thing to be doing especially as he was doing a leak test. I can see the funny side in a way but also potentially putting his life and my home and life in jeopardy. How easily does gas ignite lol.

Tim.

Good that you can see the funny side but i'd have been livid!
Having worked in the oil&gas industry (upstream) and specifically on oil,gas,water & sand separation i can reliably inform that it doesnt take much of a concentration of any type of natural gaas to reach a point of ignition and a potential flashover. Natural gas has a low explosive limit but significantly, does have an autoignition temperature limit. Not sure what the end of a ciggy burns at but gas ignites around 500C.
There could have been sufficient buildup in that relatively enclosed area for gas to collect in a quantity required for ignition.
As you say, you could smell it and this is an indication of a definite localised presence of gas.
He would have no idea of the gas density unless he was equipped with a gas density meter. Ergo it becomes a high risk situation having him sucking on a cancer stick in the presence of natural gas.
I'd suggest sending a copy of the video to the company 'for their information'.

 

[RickRob]

It's OK - your new supply is non-flammable!

 

[TitanTim]

Christ on a bike! What a plonker.
I'm not 100% but I'm pretty sure that 'not smoking while servicing a gas mains' would be one of the more serious health&safety directives during his training and once on the job.
I'd be having a word with his super.

Part of me is thinking am I missing something and is it as dangerous as I think it is as he obviously doesn't think so. I could smell gas so surely that is not a sensible thing to be doing especially as he was doing a leak test. I can see the funny side in a way but also potentially putting his life and my home and life in jeopardy. How easily does gas ignite lol.

Tim.

Good that you can see the funny side but i'd have been livid!
Having worked in the oil&gas industry (upstream) and specifically on oil,gas,water & sand separation i can reliably inform that it doesnt take much of a concentration of any type of natural gaas to reach a point of ignition and a potential flashover. Natural gas has a low explosive limit but significantly, does have an autoignition temperature limit. Not sure what the end of a ciggy burns at but gas ignites around 500C.
There could have been sufficient buildup in that relatively enclosed area for gas to collect in a quantity required for ignition.
As you say, you could smell it and this is an indication of a definite localised presence of gas.
He would have no idea of the gas density unless he was equipped with a gas density meter. Ergo it becomes a high risk situation having him sucking on a cancer stick in the presence of natural gas.
I'd suggest sending a copy of the video to the company 'for their information'.

Thanks Chris, the thing is he came into the house to check the boiler would come work OK and when I followed him back to the door I noticed his cigarette on the floor outside still burning and he picked it back up and I said should you be having a crafty fag and he laughed it off. It was then I thought of checking the security cam as I couldn't believe he'd been smoking. He obviously must have thought there was no danger but I'm no expert but to me there was gas in the air and he had a lighted cigarette whilst performing tests on the meter which has got to be a no no, either that or he's just incredibly thick.

End of the day no harm done but I also thinking there was every possibility of an explosion, or maybe I'm being melodramatic :lol:

Tim.

 

[TitanTim]

It's OK - your new supply is non-flammable!

Good job it is too :lol:

Tim.

 

[Chris_D]

Part of me is thinking am I missing something and is it as dangerous as I think it is as he obviously doesn't think so. I could smell gas so surely that is not a sensible thing to be doing especially as he was doing a leak test. I can see the funny side in a way but also potentially putting his life and my home and life in jeopardy. How easily does gas ignite lol.

Tim.

Good that you can see the funny side but i'd have been livid!
Having worked in the oil&gas industry (upstream) and specifically on oil,gas,water & sand separation i can reliably inform that it doesnt take much of a concentration of any type of natural gaas to reach a point of ignition and a potential flashover. Natural gas has a low explosive limit but significantly, does have an autoignition temperature limit. Not sure what the end of a ciggy burns at but gas ignites around 500C.
There could have been sufficient buildup in that relatively enclosed area for gas to collect in a quantity required for ignition.
As you say, you could smell it and this is an indication of a definite localised presence of gas.
He would have no idea of the gas density unless he was equipped with a gas density meter. Ergo it becomes a high risk situation having him sucking on a cancer stick in the presence of natural gas.
I'd suggest sending a copy of the video to the company 'for their information'.

Thanks Chris, the thing is he came into the house to check the boiler would come work OK and when I followed him back to the door I noticed his cigarette on the floor outside still burning and he picked it back up and I said should you be having a crafty fag and he laughed it off. It was then I thought of checking the security cam as I couldn't believe he'd been smoking. He obviously must have thought there was no danger but I'm no expert but to me there was gas in the air and he had a lighted cigarette whilst performing tests on the meter which has got to be a no no, either that or he's just incredibly thick.

End of the day no harm done but I also thinking there was every possibility of an explosion, or maybe I'm being melodramatic :lol:

Tim.

I'd be callin it extremely negligent and over-confident in him laughing off your concern.

 

[TitanTim]

I think I got off lightly :?

I was looking at a neighbours house a few doors away, they've moved his meter from the back (inside the kitchen) to the outside front of the house in a box under a window and plumbed the meter into the mains. They have then run a 22mm copper pipe from the meter along the external wall and get this around a shrub growing against the wall, they couldn't be arsed removing the shrub :lol: then under the front door, through the brickwork into the garage and then to the back of the house and plumbed it into the pipework in the house. Talk about a bodge job, I couldn't believe my eyes and worse still I could smell gas at the front of the house probably coming from one of the joints along the pipe.

I'm glad now I refused to have my meter moved.

Tim.

 

[Chris_D]

Cowboys.
Prob on crap demotivating zero hours contract.

 

[slick]

My uncle was a plumber and I remember watching him check for gas leaks with his cigarette lighter

 

[TitanTim]

I was very tempted to send the video off to the National Grid and Balfour Beatty the contractors but as my house didn't blow up and all is good decided against it :roll:

Tim.