Flaming faucets alarm North Texas family

KHOU ^ | Thursday, 08 July 2010 | JIM DOUGLAS / WFAA

[Willie Green]

MONTAGUE COUNTY, Texas — A startling discovery is igniting fears about whether oil and gas drilling has ruined ground water in a rural Montague County community.

It's not just salty water coming out of the faucets at Stephen Brock's home near Bowie, about 70 miles northwest of Fort Worth; it's natural gas.

Brock knew his pipes gurgled, but he didn't realize they were burping flammable gas until Monday.

He decided to test his faucet after watching a documentary on drilling. He ignited a lighter next to the running water.

"It totally engulfed the whole sink," Brock said. "I jumped back and shut the water off, then I called the Railroad Commission right away."

The Texas Railroad commission examines drilling issues. Brock said investigators took samples the next day, and returned for more right after the phenomenon was documented by News 8.

"The Railroad Commission guy told me, 'Yeah, it's coming in your well, up through your well,'" Brock said.

[SuziQ]

Fracking ping!!

[Constitution Day]

LMAO!!

[mountainlion]

Usually around here the only gas to be concerned about is radon.

[Buckeye McFrog]

sounds like a Green Acres episode (is his toaster a “5”?)

[dragnet2]

Hook that stuff up to the furnace and the hot water heater.

Just don't use the toilet while smoking....

[Hillbillary]

Pfister Pflaming Pfaucets.

[dragnet2]

It can double for a Texas BBQ!

[dragnet2]

"The Railroad Commission guy told me, 'Yeah, it's coming in your well, up through your well,'"

Did he mention it was coming up through the well?

Did they check with the Airport Commission first prior to releasing this information?

[Liberty Valance]

splish-splash i was takin' a bath ....*woosh*

[Rebelbase]

“Did they check with the Airport Commission first prior to releasing this information? “

No, they only handle septic tank issues.

[dragnet2]

lol..

[The Comedian]

MONTAGUE COUNTY, Texas, where watering the lawn can start a forest fire.

Frowning takes 68 muscles.
Smiling takes 6.
Pulling this trigger takes 2.
I'm lazy.

[Wuli]

Someone needs to go to Bowie and set up a little company that will sell and install a gadget in each home that will obtain and extract the gas from the water, right as the water reaches the house, together with piping to route the gas to a storage tank for the energy for heat and hot water, along with another pipe from the storage tank through a meter connected to the utility company’s natural gas grid - for selling the excess to the utility company.

[epithermal]

Methane is everywhere in the subsurface. Most likely this well was contaminated from a natural biogenic source and if it had been properly tested it could have been distinguished from deep gas coming from natural gas production. As an example look at the case history of this in Maine and New Hampshire where there are ZERO gas production wells and yet while drilling a water well the drilling rig exploded from methane gas coming from granite: In August 2004, a commercial drill rig was destroyed by ignition of an explosive gas released during the drilling of a domestic well in granitic bedrock in Tyngsborough, MA.