CHENNAI: The fire caused by LPG leak in a house at Saligramam on Sunday, which has three residents battling for life, has once again thrown the spotlight on the safety of cooking gas cylinders and causes behind the blasts. According to official records, Tamil Nadu recorded 596 deaths in 2013 due to cylinder/stove blasts, the highest in the country. In Chennai, at least one person died every week due to a LPG leak fire in 2013.
Leaks occur due to mechanical failure of the O-ring, a thin rubber ring at the regulator-cylinder interface to prevent escape of gas. M Shankar, manager at Sowmiya Gas agency, said that chances of O-ring failure were miniscule. “There might be only two to three or maximum 10 defects out of 13,000 to 14,000 cylinders we supply every month. When we spot it, we send it back and arrange for a defect certificate,” he said.
Shankar said that O-ring failure happened in cases where there was frequent refilling. The opening and closing of regulator would cause the ring to fail, he added. He said that other causes included the defects in the body of cylinders due to usage after expiry date. “Every cylinder has an alphanumeric code that denotes the expiry date. For example, A14 is March 2014,” he added.
A senior official of Indian Oil said that chances for defects in the body of cylinder were less as the companies had automated and manual safety tests in place before delivery. “As far as the O-ring is concerned, it is the responsibility of the customer to ensure its condition when the gas cylinder is delivered. Some people don’t allow the delivery guy to come inside the house and check. Some might have it delivered to neighbours. Consumers have the right to demand a proper, fully-safe cylinder,” he said. Shankar, and a senior Indian Oil official who spoke to CE, maintained that consumer negligence was the main cause for the blasts due to gas leakage. “Even if you look at a recent case in Salem, the person had kept the stove on for boiling milk. The milk overflowed and put the fire out, but the gas nozzle was not turned off,” he said. When there is evidence of a gas leak (LPG is odourless, but consumers can smell a leak by the odour of mercaptan, a sulphur-based compound added to the gas), the place should be vacated and company helpline should be contacted, he added.
R Natraj, former Director General of Police and former director of Fire and Rescue Service Department, said that gas could leak out of tubes if they weren’t replaced periodically (six months or a year).
When asked of the possibility of illegal operators delivering cylinders past their expiry date, the Indian Oil official declined to comment, but did not rule out the possibility.
As far as legal liability is concerned, consumer activist S Saroja of the Consumer Action Group said that it lay with the gas companies and agencies. “They cannot escape responsibility and have to ensure safety of the cylinders,” she said. However, she agreed that accidents in case of illegal cylinders were a grey area as the authorities could not be blamed for that. “There are times when new entrants into the city borrow cylinder from a neighbor or relative,” she said.
According to the Indian Oil official, distributors and oil companies had taken insurance cover for settlement to victims, but said that the gas companies and distributors couldn’t be blamed for consumer negligence.
