GILROY
– The Chevron gas pumps at Monterey and Tenth streets were still
shut down Monday after an explosion gave a technician second-degree
burns Saturday afternoon.
GILROY – The Chevron gas pumps at Monterey and Tenth streets were still shut down Monday after an explosion gave a technician second-degree burns Saturday afternoon.
The explosion was relatively minor but could have been much worse, according to Gilroy Fire Department Division Chief Phil King.
Tom Miller, who works for Chevron corporate, had come from San Ramon to do some work in an underground vault by the sunken gas tanks, according to a Chevron store cashier who did not give her name. While Miller was down in the vault, the cashier saw flames shoot up six to eight feet out of the manhole, she said.
“I shut off the emergency (gas) switch and called 911,” she said.
The call came in at 1:49 p.m. Saturday as a report of a “gas station island on fire,” according to King. Firefighters arrived two minutes later and treated Miller for second-degree burns on his arms and minor burns on his face and neck, King said.
King said Miller was installing metal flashing inside the vault to form a weather seal of some kind. Miller told firefighters afterward he had smelled gasoline fumes while working there, before a spark from an electric wire set those fumes alight.
“It looked like that flashing, being sharp, sheet-metal-type material, possibly frayed or cut the wire,” King said.
The vault is about seven feet deep and three-and-a-half feet in diameter, King said.
Miller declined to let paramedics transport him to the hospital; instead, King said, members of his family arrived and took him to a hospital in their private vehicle.
Fire Department officials shut down gas sales at the station until it could be verified that the area was safe for the public. They referred the inspection to the city Building, Life and Environmental Safety Division.
No inspector from this city division showed up at the gas station Saturday, Sunday or on the Monday President’s Day holiday. The cashier said she expected an inspector to come today. The Chevron convenience store was open Monday even though the gas pumps were still closed.
Fire Department officials referred Miller’s accident to the California Occupational Safety and Health Administration, standard procedure for any industrial accident, King said.
