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Wednesday, August 27, 2025 — Houston, TX

Gas leak forces several building evacuations

duncan-hall-channing-wang-web
Channing Wang/Thresher

By Savannah Kuchar     2/11/22 4:44pm

A gas leak forced multiple buildings to evacuate Thursday afternoon around 4 p.m., after a subcontractor on the New Engineering and Science Building project hit an exposed Centerpoint gas line, according to Associate Vice President for Facilities Engineering and Planning Kathy Jones.

Residents of McMurtry College and Duncan College were asked to leave the buildings for outdoor quad spaces. West servery and both college’s magister houses were also evacuated, followed shortly by the occupants of Duncan Hall. All buildings were later cleared for reentry just before 7 p.m., after the leak was fixed and air quality samples were taken, according to a message from Rice Alert.

Jones said Centerpoint made the necessary repairs to the line and that the issue is now fully resolved.





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