Explosion in Johannesburg CBD 19/7/2023

[Sinbad2000]

Haven't seen this posted anywhere.
What looks to be a sewer line explosion occurred under Bree street which is a pretty busy thoroughfare.
Last I heard there'd been one death and several injuries. Footage is just emerging now though there were several pics of the destruction flying around last night.

Spoiler: Footage of minibuses being thrown around a bit but you can't see anyone getting directly injured

 

[Sinbad2000]

How does that even happen? I guess a buildup of gases?

Good question

I know there was a week long water outage in joburg, I'm guessing perhaps there was insufficient flow in the sewers to keep things running properly and there was a buildup of methane?

Or a natural gas leak somewhere into the system that got ignited and the overpressure wave did this...

 

[Sinbad2000]

Googling suggests a gas leak from a damaged pipe, caused by a part of the road collapsing. But who knows.

The piped gas provider says they've not detected any major leaks on their network - that's not to say it's not a small leak from their lines into a sewer or something. Their pipework runs in wayleaves which are under the kerbs, not under the main road carriageways.

 

[Sinbad2000]

So... more than a year down the road... (but no, not that road - it's still in pieces)

3-year nightmare for Joburg motorists

The Johannesburg Roads Agency has fired the contractor undertaking repairs on the explosion-damaged Lilian Ngoyi Street, with the rehabilitation now delayed by at least another six months.

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