Had a steam line blow out on me last Tuesday near the old ConEd plant

Was checking a 6-inch weld on a steam header when a fitting downstream let go, shot a jet of 350-degree steam right past my face shield. Scrambled the shutdown crew in under 3 minutes but that blast could have taken my arm off. Anyone else run into sudden failures on older piping that looked solid on inspection?

3 comments

3 Comments

hugo_robinson253d ago

Man, that's wild. I had something similar happen a couple years back on an 8-inch feedwater line that the borescope gave a clean bill of health on. One day I was walking past and a section just split open with a bang, sprayed steam and rust chunks everywhere. It looked perfect on the outside but must have had hidden corrosion eating it from the inside out for years. We had to shut down the whole section for a week to replace it. Did your crew ever figure out what caused the fitting to blow?

blair_martin3d ago

Ha! Sounds like that pipe had some real trust issues. "I'm fine," it says, then BAM, takes out your whole week. Probably had a bad breakup with a boiler somewhere in its past. But seriously, those hidden failures are the worst. You think you're good, you've got the fancy camera footage to prove it, then the thing decides to go full popcorn kernel on you. Kinda makes you wonder if the borescope was just as surprised as we were. My bet? That fitting was holding a grudge. Just needed the right moment to let everyone know how it really felt. Nothing a whole lot of new pipe and a long weekend couldn't fix though, right?

roberts953d ago

Did you guys end up replacing the whole line or just that section?