Pembroke and Indian Falls have been called to the TA Travel Center in Pembroke on Rt. 77 for the odor of natural gas.
An employee there says they called National Fuel last evening, but they did not show up.
At about 1:30 p.m. an employee called again to report an odor of gas at the TA Travel Center. National Fuel told the employee there to evacuate the building.
When the Pembroke Fire Department arrived about 2 p.m. people were still inside and no one had been evacuated.
East Pembroke was also requested to the scene and is checking out the building with a gas meter. National Fuel is now in route with a four-minute ETA.
UPDATE 2:39 p.m.: All rooftop heating/cooling units have been shut off.
UPDATE 3:20 p.m.: Pembroke Town Zoning Officer is being called. The rooftop units were turned back on.
UPDATE 3:44 p.m.: The Town of Batavia zoning officer and the Darien zoning officer are responding to the TA to assist the Pembroke Fire Department.
UPDATE 4:18 p.m.: The incident at the TA Travel Center has been turned over the Town of Batavia Code Enforcement and National Grid will remain for one more hour for a line test.
The TA Travel Center is now closed.
Pembroke and Indian Falls are back in service as is East Pembroke.
I would be interested to
I would be interested to learn what sort of assistance a zoning officer is suited to provide to a fire department on a gas leak incident. From Darien's website, the zoning officer is also the code enforcement officer. Perhaps his role is to close the property until the leak is fixed and system reinspected? Certainly the fire department would at least have authority to evacuate a building initially. If anybody knows about these things, please let me know.
It's surprising that the business would ignore evacuation instructions for a full 30 minutes, apparently knowing there was a serious gas leak warranting emergency response.
Lincoln, Most town zoning
Lincoln,
Most town zoning officers, are also the code enforcement officer and have the authority to order any dwelling off limits if there is any safety issue present that could cause injury, or even death, to anyone occupying the dwelling.
They can do the same to you in your home.
Building was evacuated right
Building was evacuated right after the word from gas company to do so. Not sure where the timeline came from in the story. I was there and sent out of building shortly after 1:00 pm