Broken gas pipeline shuts 101 Freeway

A portion of the 101 Freeway in Oxnard was shut down for 2 1/ 2 hours Monday due to a gas leak.

Construction crews working for Ventura County hit a 4-inch gas pipeline around 11 a.m. on Ventura Boulevard near Balboa Street, a section of roadway that runs parallel to the north side of the freeway, and caused more than 2.33 million cubic feet of natural gas to leak into the air, authorities said.

At the request of the Oxnard Fire Department, the California Highway Patrol closed the freeway between Oxnard Boulevard and Rose Avenue.

"We closed the area because of the risk," said Deborah Shane, Oxnard Fire Department spokeswoman.

Although strong winds helped dissipate the gas and minimize the threat, pockets of natural gas could have accumulated and become volatile, Shane said.

But Peter Hidalgo, a spokesman for the Southern California Gas Co., said the leak was not a hazard.

"Natural gas . . . is lighter than air so as it was escaping it was floating up in the air and posed no threat."

Before digging, contractors and the public should call to have utility companies mark their underground lines. Reddy Pakala, director of water and sanitation for county public works, said that's what the contractor did. The gas company came out and marked their lines but failed to do so in the area where ACE Engineering Inc. was working on Monday.

"The fact of the matter is, the gas line was not marked," Pakala said.

Adding to traffic tieups Monday, a tractor trailer struck a power pole about 2 p.m. on Highway 118 just east of Bradley Road in Somis, severing the pole at its base.

The pole was thought to carry live power lines, said Officer Steve Reid with the California Highway Patrol.

Eastbound traffic was diverted to Bradley Road and traffic heading west had to take Somis Road. Highway 118 reopened at 9:09 p.m. after Southern California Edison crews installed a new pole.

- Michelle Knight