Most Of Needles Lost Gas Service Much Of Wednesday And Thursday

(February 20)  Gas service to residences and businesses in Needles, San Bernardino County’s smallest and easternmost city, was shut off for nearly 24 hours this week.
According to a representative of Southwest Gas, the outage occurred Wednesday morning following what was supposed to be a routine test of lines, during which individual pipes are shut down temporarily. A Southwest employee inadvertently switched off the wrong valve, turning off the flow of natural gas to nearly all of the 4,844-population city. When the valve was reopened, the city’s lattice of gas pipes had lost their prime.
Restaurants and hotels had to shut down because of no hot water or cooking fuel. Homes were without fuel for cooking or heating water for showers.
While Southwest Gas maintained that 200 of its customers were without gas as of Wednesday night, reports were that at least 2,300 residents were without the service.
“Southwest Gas crews worked until 11:15 last night, and have restored service to approximately 200 customers, including all priority customers (elderly, etc.) and commercial. Restoration efforts are continuing this morning. Additional personnel from Las Vegas were brought in to assist and speed up the relight process,”  Stephen Miller, Analyst I, Communications at Southwest Gas Corporation, told a locally-based media outlet, ZachNews, on Thursday morning.
Southwest Gas established a command center for the service restoration effort near the intersection of East Broadway and Goodwill Street in Needles. Into the afternoon of Thursday, February 20, work crews were observed driving into and out of the command center, retrieving work orders for points all around the community.
As of mid-morning on February 20, the gas was not yet turned on at the Denny’s restaurant, nor the Taco Bell, nor the Carl’s Jr. and Green Burrito, nor the Munchy’s Mexican Restaurant, nor Lucy’s Mexican Restaurant, nor Cook’s Cuisine, nor China Garden, nor Valenzuela’s Café, nor Riverfront Cafe & Cocktails, nor Porky’s BBQ Restaurant, nor Burger Hut.
Gas was turned on at the River City Pizza Company, the Wagon Wheel, the Subway and Dairy Queen and Juicy’s Famous River Café and McDonald’s.
Information about the status of Domino’s Pizza and Jack in the Box was unavailable.

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