My Pipeline Worries

1
My Pipeline Worries

• Mike Holmstrom
• San Jose, CA
• The 600 pound monsters still in the room for
  pipeline safety

2
My background with pipelines

• San Bernardino 1989 Train derailment on top of a
  pipeline, cleanup of spilled load and train
  wreckage, but no hydrostatic test!

3
The first worry LF-ERW seams

• Flash seam welds also weak
• ILI has missed areas that failed just a few years
  later. Get more picky with anomalies on this type
  of pipe?
• Is spike hydrotesting enough?
• Spike test pipelines with LF-ERW pipe that have
  not had previous seam failures?
• Still seen failing Jackson WI in August 2012,
  Jones Laughlin LF-ERW made in 1961

4
Reinventing the same problem?

• LF-ERW pipe not made in 40 years. But, lack of
  fusion was seen in modern pipe by x-rays.

5
Second Locate failures

• Locate Tech training
• Abandoned in place pipelines misleading?
• Plastic pipe locating woes
• Resolution of buried objects that seem to be
  pipes
• NEVER go by just maps, drawings, or GPS to dig
  by!!

6
Third Depth of coverage

• Soil loss, drought, etc., add up over decades
• Some think you don't have to call 811 if you
  don't dig deep enough, yet, utilities may become
  very shallow!

7
My Efforts on the Web

• Working hard on the Wikipedia List of pipeline
  accidents in the United States
• http//en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pipeline_accidents