Reader comments
Gas leak closes downtown Salt Lake intersection

I work in the Eagle Gate tower and we were at first asked to evacuate. The only reason why we weren't evacuated was because the gas main blew right in front of our only exit. The article is misleading about the severity of the danger this leak caused.

Not including important information is typical of reporters.

That is not good about your exit though, your employer should REALLY look into doing something about an emergency evacuation plan and an additional exit.

That is a safety issue!

I also work in Eagle Gate Tower. The implication that an evacuation was not necessary is misleading. We were, in fact, initially told to evaculate, but later prohibited from leaving the building and turned back up the stairwell. It is clear from the smell of gas that it was not safe to leave or stay. The smell of gas was strong up to about the third floor in the stairwell, and there was no way of leaving the building safely. This was a serious safety problem here in my opinion. There were several on our floor in fear for our lives. The smell of gas permiated the elevator shaft for several hours even after the gas leak was contained. The whistle of gas emitting from the 3 inch pipe could be heard up the entire height of the building. This is the second incident of construction workers hitting utilities. The first only outed the electricity, and left the stairwells completely dark during the evaculation. The second outage was the gas main break, which I believe actually represented more of a safety threat.

You could smell the gas all the way at State St. & 100 S. Glad none of the construction workers decided to light up.

I wonder if any of their family members had been trapped in that builing if they still would have downplayed the severity of this very dangerous situation.
My daughter was trapped in the building and the panic that I felt was inexplainable, not knowing whether she would be blown into oblivion or not.

I don't see any retraction or update of the original article to reflect the true danger. I'm surprised by that.