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March 24, 2008

Lab room gas leak briefly evacuates Lincoln High

LINCOLN -- The high school was evacuated for about 14 minutes this morning after a Bunsen burner valve was found to be open and letting natural gas escape into a lab room, Acting Principal Elizabeth Marquis said.

No one was hurt and the source was quickly discovered by member of the Albion Fire Department, Marquis said. Deputy Fire Chief Robert Valentine said the source was a Bunsen burner valve that had been left open. He said firefighters examined the valves and natural gas equipment in the room and found it all to be in good working order.

Marquis said school officials were unsure how the valve got to be opened.

The source of the gas was located by a combustible gas detector the department uses on such calls, which goes off with an increasingly fast beep as it approaches the source of a gas leak.

Valentine said judging by the amount of gas, which was mostly confined to the single laboratory, the valve could not have been open for that long. He said a teacher had been in the room earlier with no problem and, upon returning, noticed the smell of gas.

An override valve under the counter where the burner had been was left on instead of off, Valentine said, but that may have been inadvertently knocked into the wrong position. After firefighters examined all the natural gas-related lines and equipment in the room and found them to be in good shape and the room was aired out, students were allowed back in, he said.

-- Journal staff writer John Hill

Posted by Mike McKinney  at 7:00 PM | Permalink

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