Oil and Gas Explosions Are Fairly Common
On Monday morning, a man was killed by an explosion at an oil well in Bolivar, Ohio. The man is believed to have been an employee working on the site, but his identity won’t be released until it is confirmed with dental records.
This wasn’t big news in Pittsburgh, even though Bolivar is just a two hour drive from here. But why not? Is it because the incident was across state lines, or because tragedies of this sort are actually fairly routine? The answer, I think, is “both”.
In yesterday’s Pipeline, the Post-Gazette reported on a story of President Obama talking energy policy in Cincinnati. This is hardly comparable, because the words of the President are routinely discussed in national and international media. The same is not true of accidents, even those leading to fatalities, unless the number of victims or the amount of property damage is exceptionally high.
I’m not suggesting that every incident that leads to a fatality is necessarily deserving of nationwide coverage, but in some cases, the model of regional coverage can keep people from realizing that dangerous patterns exist.
As I was trying to research the incident, I kept finding more and more of them, some of which I was already aware of, some of which I was not. Here are a few examples from the past two years: Read more:http://www.fractracker.org/2012/07/oil-and-gas-explosions-are-fairly-common/
