Centreville residents share eroding trust in Washington Gas amid ongoing leak

We are getting a new sense of the eroding trust the Centreville community has in Washington Gas as a weeklong disaster stretches into the weekend.

News4 was invited to join a community Zoom meeting Friday to hear concerns from people who have been evacuated or had their gas shut off, and others who are demanding answers and assurances that their homes are safe. The community members asked that we blur their faces and not share their names, but their stories are critical to understanding the scope of the failure that led to a house exploding Sunday night, and why residents feel like Washington Gas is continuing to fail this community as they continue searching for gas leaks.

Neighbors tell News4 several calls were placed to Washington Gas on Sunday morning, reporting the smell of natural gas. Residents say Washington Gas crews were in their neighborhood as early as 9 a.m. Sunday morning.

“They were digging something in the yard. We saw that at 6:30 in the evening,” one resident said.

“They were on site when it happened, when the explosion took place,” another said. “I’ve heard from someone else that they tried to leave and that they had to be prevented from leaving the scene by either fire or police.”

News4 has heard from multiple people who say they saw Washington Gas crews attempting to leave the explosion scene.

All week long, News4 has asked Washington Gas for specifics, but the company defers to the NTSB, citing an ongoing federal investigation. On Wednesday, when the NTSB held a joint press conference with Fairfax County Fire and Rescue, the group was asked if anyone from Washington Gas was there to answer questions too.

They weren’t, and the look on the NTSB spokesperson’s face, paired with his silence, says a lot.

Now, a frustrated community is calling the company out.

Fairfax Fire and Rescue crews confirmed gas is still leaking from a pipe owned and maintained by Washington Gas, but the specific location hasn’t been found. The best guess, as of Wednesday, was a thousand-foot stretch near the site of the explosion.

But then this happened: “They made it seem like they isolated the cause and narrowed the focus, but then … they were digging up holes and when asked, they were very elusive,” a resident said.

News4 also saw that on Thursday. We spoke with the homeowner there.

“Last night, for them to find a small leak on the meter of my house, that’s also terrifying,” she said.

Was it another leak? The only leak? Washington Gas won’t say.

On Friday, Washington Gas sent a letter to the community saying in part: “Our immediate focus is supporting those affected and ensuring the continued safety of our system.”

Washington Gas is covering hotel expenses for people evacuated and those without gas service. Some of the evacuated residents have been notified that it’s safe to return to their homes, but neighbors said most of those people still don’t feel safe to do that.

“We can’t trust that the guy that shows up is gonna actually do something, because as has been said, they didn’t knock on doors, they didn’t call 911, and a house exploded,” a resident said.