Sharon Kelly, DeSmogBlog
Waking Times
A family in Texas, including a four-year old, her parents and her grandfather, were severely burned when their water well ignited into a massive fireball after methane from nearby fracked wells contaminated their water supply, a newly filed lawsuit against EOG Resources and several related companies alleges.
Cody Murray, a 38-year old who previously worked in the oil and gas industry, suffered burns to his face, arms, neck and back that were so severe that he was left permanently disabled, no longer able to drive because the nerve damage has left him unable to grip steering wheels or other objects. Cody’s young daughter, who was over 20 feet away from the pump house when it ignited, suffered first and second degree burns, as did Jim Murray, Cody’s father.
The cause of the blast? Nearby fracked wells, the lawsuit alleges. “Rigorous scientific testing, including isotope testing, has conclusively demonstrated that the high-level methane contamination of the Murrays ’ water well resulted from natural gas drilling and extraction activities,” the complaint, filed in Dallas County, Texas earlier this month, states.
The family raised livestock and crops on their 160-acre ranch in Perrin, Texas, a tiny unincorporated town (population: 500) in Jack County, northwest of Forth Worth and atop the Barnett shale. The heavily-drilled county has been struck by a string of earthquakes since 2013.
The region also made headlines this summer when a research team from the University of Texas at Arlington announced that tests showed hundreds of water wells – 381 of the 550 wells tested – were contaminated by chemicals associated with fracking.
But while much of the water pollution associated with fracking is invisible — parts per million or per billion of highly toxic chemicals lacing water that otherwise looks safe — some of the most notorious incidents associated with fracking involve tap water lighting on fire, the result of flammable methane gas bubbles mixing with the water.
For the Murrays, the trouble began with a sputtering water hose. On August 2, 2014, Ashley Murray, Cody’s wife, noticed something odd as she filled a water trough for the family’s cattle — pressurized water was spitting out from the hose, spraying throughout the pump house built around the well. She cut the water off and went to get Cody. According to the complaint:
Cody’s dad, Jim, entered the doorway to the pump house and switched the water on. At the flip of the switch, Cody heard a ‘whooshing’ sound , which he instantly recognized from his work in the oil and gas industry, and instinctively picked his father up and physically threw him back and away from the entryway to the pump house. In that instant, a giant fireball erupted from the pump house, burning Cody and Jim, who were at the entrance to the pump house, as well as Ashley and A.M. [the four-year old], who were approximately twenty feet away. Cody andA.M.were air-lifted to Parkland Hospital, while Jim was transported to Palo Pinto General Hospital.
The suspected source of the methane in the water? Two gas wells drilled by EOG Resources roughly 1,000 feet away from the Murrays’ water well.
The Texas Railroad Commission, the state’s oil and gas regulator, later cited EOG for “discrepancies” in legally-required records for the wells’ cement casings and the agency’s investigation into the fireball is still underway, according to the complaint.
The Murray’s lawsuit, which seeks over $1 million dollars to compensate the family for their medical expenses, Cody’s disability and resulting lost job, and the loss of their farm’s water supply, is one of a growing number of legal cases surrounding fracking.
“This is a potentially landmark case,” Christopher Hamilton, the attorney representing the Murrays toldThinkProgress, explaining that the type of isotopic analysis connecting methane in the Murray’s water to fracking could help plaintiffs nationwide prove that the gas in their water came from the fracked wells and was not the kind of gas that occurs naturally at the relatively shallow depths where water wells are drilled.
Nationwide, litigation surrounding fracking’s impacts has continued to rise even as the number of rigs drilling for oil and gas has shrunk with the fall of oil prices.