EDITOR'S NOTEBOOK

According to the EIA, there are more than 200 natural gas pipeline systems in the United States. According to the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), that rupture produced a crater about 72 feet long by 26 feet wide, released approximately 47.6 million standard cubic feet of natural gas, resulted in a fire that included eight fatalities, destroyed 38 homes and damaged 70 others. The system was initially developed to address problems of inter-agency responses to wildfires in California and Arizona but it has evolved into use in all-hazards situations, ranging from active shootings to HazMat scenes, including pipeline ruptures.