Gas Leak at Home: What to Do in the First 60 Seconds

Natural gas leaks are among the few household hazards where the wrong instinctive action is genuinely dangerous. The instinct is to switch on a light to see what is happening, or to use a phone right there in the room. Both create the one thing a room full of gas needs.

This guide covers how to recognise a leak, the order of actions and why that order is the order, the mistakes that cause explosions, and how to find and fix leaks before they become emergencies.

How to recognise a leak

The smell. Natural gas is odourless in its natural state, so a distinctive odorant — usually mercaptan, which smells of rotten eggs or sulphur — is added specifically so that leaks can be detected by nose. If you smell rotten eggs and there are no rotten eggs, treat it as gas.

The sound. A hiss or whistle near a pipe, joint, hose or meter. In a quiet room a significant leak is audible.

The sight. Bubbles in standing water near a buried line, unexplained dead patches of grass or plants along a pipe route, dust or soil being disturbed at a spot on the ground with no wind.

The flame. A gas flame should burn blue and steady. A persistently yellow or orange flame, or one that lifts and flickers, indicates incomplete combustion — which is a different and equally serious hazard, because incomplete combustion produces carbon monoxide.

The symptoms. Headaches, dizziness, nausea, unexplained drowsiness or shortness of breath in several people in the same house — particularly if they improve when everyone goes outside. This pattern is the classic signature of carbon monoxide, and it deserves to be taken more seriously than almost anything else on this list, because carbon monoxide has no smell at all.

The order of actions, and why

1. Do not create a spark

A room with gas in it needs one ignition source. Almost anything electrical can be one, because the spark that matters happens inside the switch as the contacts meet or part.

That means: no light switches on or off, no fans, no extractors, no doorbells, no mains plugs, no torches switched on inside the room, and no phone used at the meter or in a room where the smell is strong.

Turning a light off is exactly as dangerous as turning it on. If a light is already on, leave it on.

2. Ventilate as you leave

Open doors and windows on your way out. This is not a project — you are not clearing the room, you are giving the gas somewhere to go while you leave. Do not spend a minute opening everything; open what is on your path.

3. Turn off the main valve if you safely can

There is a valve at or near the meter that shuts off the supply to the property. If it is on your way out and you can reach it without going towards the smell, turn it off.

Find that valve today, before you need it. Locating it while a room smells of gas is a bad time to be learning where it is.

If reaching it means going into the strongest part of the smell, skip it. The supply can be shut off from outside by SSGC.

4. Get everyone out

Everyone — including anyone asleep, anyone who says they will be fine, and pets. Go far enough that you are not standing next to the building. Do not go back in for possessions.

5. Call 1199 from outside

The universal help line operates 24 hours. Tell them:

• Your address, clearly and completely, with a landmark.
• That you can smell gas and how strong it is.
• Whether anyone is unwell.
• Whether you managed to shut off the valve.
• A mobile number they can call back on.

Ask for the complaint number, and stay outside until somebody who knows what they are doing tells you it is safe.

The mistakes that cause explosions

Switching on a light to see. The most common and the most lethal. The spark is inside the switch.

Using a phone or a torch in the room. Call from outside. Both are electrical devices.

Lighting a match or a lighter to check. People do this. A gas leak is never diagnosed with a flame.

Starting a car in an attached garage. The ignition system is an ignition source, and a garage is a confined space.

Trying to repair it yourself. Tightening a joint with a spanner while gas escapes is not a repair, it is an improvisation next to an explosion. Leave it.

Going back inside "just for a minute." The reason people go back in is always trivial and the outcome sometimes is not.

Ignoring a faint smell because it is faint. A small leak in a ventilated room is a small leak. The same leak in a closed room overnight is not.

Who to call

1199 covers the whole SSGC network — Karachi, Hyderabad, Nawabshah, Sukkur, Larkana, Quetta, Sibi and the areas around them. You do not need a zone-specific number in an emergency; that is the point of a universal line.

For non-urgent follow-up afterwards, your zone office is the right channel, and the zone directory on our homepage lists all seventeen Karachi zones and the six regional offices with their phone numbers.

WhatsApp is not for emergencies. A message may sit unread. Call.

Finding leaks before they become emergencies

The soapy water test is safe, free, and takes ten minutes.

1. Mix washing-up liquid with water until it is properly soapy.
2. Brush or spray it onto every joint, connection and along the length of every rubber hose.
3. Watch for bubbles forming or growing. Bubbles mean gas escaping.
4. If you find one, turn off the appliance and the supply to it, and get it repaired before using it again.

Never use a flame to test for a leak. Ever. Not a match, not a lighter, not a candle.

The other test costs nothing: turn off every gas appliance including all pilot lights, then watch the smallest billing digit or dial on your meter for several minutes. Movement with everything off means gas is going somewhere it should not. Our meter reading guide shows which digits to watch.

This test has a useful side effect — a slow leak is also a bill you are paying for gas you never used, which is one of the causes on our list of reasons a bill is unexpectedly high.

The things worth fixing this month

• Rubber hoses. They perish, crack and harden, particularly near heat. Check them, and replace on a schedule rather than when they fail.
• Regulators. They have a service life. An old regulator is a known failure point.
• Geyser flues. A blocked or disconnected flue is what turns a geyser into a carbon monoxide source.
• Ventilation. Every room with a gas appliance needs air movement. A bathroom with a geyser and no ventilation is the single most dangerous configuration in a Pakistani home.
• Appliances behind furniture. Air needs to reach them, and you need to be able to reach the valve.

The full room-by-room version is in the annual gas safety checklist.

The short version

No switches. Open what is on your way out. Shut the valve if it is safe. Everyone out. Call 1199 from outside.

Five steps, in that order. Read them twice today and find your main valve while you are at it — those two minutes are the entire preparation this emergency requires.