Source:
Reuters NewsExplosion and fire hit major Russian gas pipeline
Thu Jul 26, 2007 3:13AM IST
Email | Print | Digg | Single Page
<-> Text <+>
ST PETERSBURG, Russia (Reuters) - An explosion and fire hit a major gas pipeline in northwest Russia early on Thursday but it was unclear if exports were affected, officials and witnesses said.
"It is an explosion on a trunk gas pipeline under high pressure," said Valentin Sedorin, a spokesman for the Leningrad region around Russia's second city of St Petersburg.
It was not immediately clear if the pipeline carried gas for export. The main route for Russian gas to Europe, the Yamal-Europe pipeline, is well to the south. But a pipeline shipping gas to Finland is near the area where the explosion happened.
There was no word on casualties but witnesses spoke of a massive explosion that shook buildings 5 km away. Officials did not say what caused the blast.
A Reuters reporter on his way to the scene of the blast by road said he could see flames and the air was thick with smoke. He said the opposite carriageway was clogged with vehicles trying to flee.
A spokesperson for TGC-1, an electricity generating company with a power station on the outskirts of St Petersburg, said the explosion was at a gas pipeline next to the station.
Read more:
http://in.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idINIndia-28656720070725
OK... what IS going on? It seems like, there's Pipe explosion's going off everywhere past few days???