El Rio Crash Sets Off Natural Gas Leak

A collision Friday morning between a loaded cement truck and a van in El Rio caused a utility pressure valve to snap, spewing natural gas into the air and forcing the lockdown of the nearby Rio Mesa High School campus.

The crash occurred about 9:30 a.m. at Rose and Central avenues in an unincorporated area near Oxnard. As a precaution, all roadways within an eight-square-mile radius were blocked to traffic.

The valve was replaced within an hour and no serious injuries were reported.

“These types of incidents are always of great concern” because of the possibility of an explosion, said California Highway Patrol Officer Steve Reid.

At the time, a prescribed burn was occurring about a mile away in a citrus orchard. Emergency personnel said the flames and smoke in this instance were not a concern because natural gas dissipates quickly in the atmosphere.

According to Reid, Eugenia Bunker, 45, of Oxnard was driving her 1997 Plymouth van south on Rose Avenue when she was broadsided by a Cemex cement truck being driven east on Central Avenue by Roy Villanueva, 47, of Santa Paula.

Both Bunker, who was returning home from Mesa elementary school in Somis where her children are students, and Villanueva were treated at St. John’s Regional Medical Center in Oxnard for neck and back pain and released.

The impact of the collision destroyed the passenger side of the van and shoved it several dozen feet down the roadway and over the top of a small natural gas regulator station.

Gas Company spokesman Joe Chow said that when the pressure valve was snapped off, a safety mechanism that regulates pipeline pressure was immediately activated. The regulator station prevents too much gas from building up in pipes, which can cause explosions.

“In the event of an accident like this, the safety mechanism always kicks in,” Chow said. “What it does is essentially releases any gas that was in the pipeline.”

About 700,000 cubic feet of natural gas leaked into the air for 45 minutes until workers could replace the valve, Chow said. Students and faculty at Rio Mesa High were not harmed by the gas, nor were crops in the surrounding strawberry fields, he added.

Rio Mesa Principal Ed Philips said the school’s faculty and its 2,100 students were instructed to remain inside classrooms with doors and windows closed. At the time of the break, most students were already in second-period classes and not outside, Philips said.

Senta Raper, an 18-year-old senior who was in the school’s office during the incident, said she was surprised to arrive on campus for her first class of the day and find all the gates closed and no one around.

“I was like, whoa,” Raper said. “It sucks because I really wanted to go to my third period [class].”