West Bank Facilities Management evacuated Willey Hall and the Art Building early Tuesday afternoon when a gas main ruptured in a construction site on the west side of the Art Building.
Natural gas billowed out of the ruptured pipe until the Minneapolis Fire Department and Minnegasco arrived to shut the gas valves off. Facilities Management cleared the building and shut off the fan systems, hoping to stop the potentially flammable and noxious gas from entering any of the nearby buildings.
“When you look at all the digging they do around here, this seldom happens,” said Bill O’Neill, West Bank facilities manager “There’s all sorts of piping, water, gas, drainage. A lot of it has been laid down there a long time. If the prints are not as accurate as they should be, you can run into these sorts of problems.”
— Sean Madigan