Centralia, Pennsylvania has suffered through underground coal mine fires that caused sinkholes, carbon monoxide plumes and underground temperatures that left it uninhabitable. It's been evacuated and condemned.
What else could possibly go wrong?

Map of major natural gas and oil pipelines in the United States. Hazardous liquid lines in red, gas transmission lines in blue. Source: Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration.

By Lena Groeger, ProPublica

At 6:11 p.m. on September 6, 2010, San Bruno, Calif. 911 received an urgent call. A gas station had just exploded and a fire with flames reaching 300 feet was raging through the neighborhood. The explosion was so large that residents suspected an airplane crash. But the real culprit was found underground: a ruptured pipeline spewing natural gas caused a blast that left behind a 72 foot long crater, killed eight people, and injured more than fifty.

Over 2,000 miles away in Michigan, workers were still cleaning up another pipeline accident, which spilled 840,000 gallons of crude oil into the Kalamazoo River in 2010. Estimated to cost $800 million, the accident is the most expensive pipeline spill in U.S. history.

Over the last few years a series of incidents have brought pipeline safety to national u2013 and presidential u2013 attention. As Obama begins his second term he will likely make a key decision on the controversial Keystone XL pipeline, a proposed pipeline extension to transport crude from Canada to the Gulf of Mexico.

The administration first delayed the permit for the pipeline on environmental grounds, but has left the door open to future proposals for Keystone's northern route. Construction on the southern route is already underway, sparking fierce opposition from some landowners and environmentalists.

The problem, protesters say, is that any route will pose hazards to the public. While pipeline operator TransCanada has declared that Keystone will be the safest pipeline ever built in North America, critics are skeptical.

"It's inevitable that as pipelines age, as they are exposed to the elements, eventually they are going to spill," said Tony Iallonardo of the National Wildlife Federation. "They're ticking time bombs."

Critics of the Keystone proposal point to the hundreds of pipeline accidents that occur every year. They charge that system wide, antiquated pipes, minimal oversight and inadequate precautions put the public and the environment at increasing risk. Pipeline operators point to billions of dollars spent on new technologies and a gradual improvement over the last two decades as proof of their commitment to safety.

Pipelines are generally regarded as a safe way to transport fuel, a far better alternative to tanker trucks or freight trains. The risks inherent in transporting fuel through pipelines are analogous to the risks inherent in traveling by airplane. Airplanes are safer than cars, which kill about 70 times as many people a year (highway accidents killed about 33,000 people in 2010, while aviation accidents killed 472). But when an airplane crashes, it is much more deadly than any single car accident, demands much more attention, and initiates large investigations to determine precisely what went wrong.

The same holds true for pipelines. Based on fatality statistics from 2005 through 2009, oil pipelines are roughly 70 times as safe as trucks, which killed four times as many people during those years, despite transporting only a tiny fraction of fuel shipments. But when a pipeline does fail, the consequences can be catastrophic (though typically less so than airplane accidents), with the very deadliest accidents garnering media attention and sometimes leading to a federal investigation.

While both air travel and pipelines are safer than their road alternatives, the analogy only extends so far. Airplanes are replaced routinely and older equipment is monitored regularly for airworthiness and replaced when it reaches its safety limits. Pipelines, on the other hand, can stay underground, carrying highly pressurized gas and oil for decades u2013 even up to a century and beyond. And while airplanes have strict and uniform regulations and safety protocols put forth by the Federal Aviation Administration, such a uniform set of standards does not exist for pipelines.

Critics maintain that while they're relatively safe, pipelines should be safer. In many cases, critics argue, pipeline accidents could have been prevented with proper regulation from the government and increased safety measures by the industry. The 2.5 million miles of America's pipelines suffer hundreds of leaks and ruptures every year, costing lives and money. As existing lines grow older, critics warn that the risk of accidents on those lines will only increase.

While states with the most pipeline mileage u2013 like Texas, California, and Louisiana u2013 also have the most incidents, breaks occur throughout the far-flung network of pipelines. Winding under city streets and countryside, these lines stay invisible most of the time. Until they fail.

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Hurricane Sandy left a trail of destruction in its wake on Tuesday, October 30, as it moved inland after battering the US northeast coastline. This video shows the devastation in Seaside Heights, in New Jersey, as a National Guard helicopter flies overhead searching for displaced residents on Tuesday.

The official death toll in the U.S. from the superstorm Sandy climbed to 33 by Tuesday, with most of the fatalities being attributed to falling trees. Outside the U.S., one person was killed in Canada and 67 in the Caribbean, including 51 in Haiti. The storm weakened as it made its way west through the U.S., but still dropped three to four inches of snow in West Virginia, where one storm chaser called it a “nor’easter on steroids.” Wind and rain also damaged the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland. As of 5 a.m. Tuesday, the storm was centered about 90 miles west of Philadelphia, with winds of about 65 miles per hour.

14th St. NYC Con Ed Coal Plant (Or the substation, conflicting reports) explodes.

In a press conference in the wake of Hurricane Sandy, Mayor Michael Bloomberg said that the storm’s destruction will be felt for quite some time, and it might be the worst the worst the city’s ever experienced. He said that the death toll in the city is at 10, but the number is expected to rise. The main priorities are getting the subway system up and running and restoring power, which may take three to four days. Bridges are being cleared and reopened. Con Ed says there has been “unprecedented damage” and there are approximately 750,000 New Yorkers without power.

Long line of ambulances outside the NYU Medical Center. Via @bananarams.

New York City’s transit chief called Hurricane Sandy the most “devastating” event to the city’s subway system ever while the rest of the city reeled from the storm early Tuesday morning. As of Monday night, seven subway tunnels under the East River had flooded, as did the Queens Midtown Tunnel, and Metropolitan Transit Authority chairman Joseph Lhota said there is “no firm timeline” for when the system would be back up and running, even as nearly every bridge and tunnel out of Manhattan was closed down. A backup electrical system failed New York University Medical Center, one of the city’s best hospitals, forcing the evacuation all 215 patients in the strong wind gusts. Meanwhile, a six-alarm fire at Breezy Point in southern Queens had destroyed 50 houses, with 198 firefighters fighting the blaze.

The New York City skyline with power out compared to a normal shot. Via the AP.

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Over 900 people have sought medical treatment following a massive fire at a Chevron oil refinery in Richmond, California this week. Tens of thousands of area residents were ordered to stay in their homes with the windows and doors closed after a series of blasts Monday sparked blazing fires that sent huge plumes of smoke. Chevron now says the situation is under control.

Amy Goodman and Nermeen ShaikhI of DemocracyNow! talk with Richmond Mayor Gayle McLaughlin, a member of the Green Party, who is seeking a full investigation into the blaze.

“We have a community that has been fighting Chevron for a long time, and I’m proud to and honored to stand for that community,” McLaughlin said.

Also joining the discussion is Andres Soto, the Richmond organizer for Communities for a Better Environment, an environmental justice group that has previously sued Chevron over what it says was a shoddy environmental impact report. “They refuse to sit at the table, they refuse to negotiate in good faith with the community over a wide range of issues, whether it’s fair taxation or whether it’s environmental safety and environmental justice,” Soto said.

Full transcript available here.