How To Tell If There Is A Gas Leak Inside Your Home
Although natural gas can be a fantastic source of energy for your home, it can also be incredibly dangerous if not managed correctly. Every year hundreds of people are hospitalized due to gas-related injuries and undetected gas leaks inside their homes.
Unfortunately, since natural gas is also odorless, it can be nearly impossible to determine whether or not there is a leak in your home until it's too late. Below is a list of a few ways that you can detect a leak in your home's gas line. If you suspect that there might be a problem, contact your local plumber to schedule a gas line repair service immediately.
Physical Symptoms
Natural gas displaces the oxygen of any area that it's in, which means if you have a leak inside your home, you and anyone that's inside will suffer from at least a mild case of oxygen deprivation. While the symptoms can reflect several different types of illnesses, pay attention to a grouping of symptoms that indicate there's a leak in your home's gas line. Things such as dizziness, headaches, throat and eye irritation, as well as breathing difficulties and fatigue, are all telltale signs of oxygen deprivation and need to be checked out immediately. Plants need oxygen to survive too, so a series of dead plants located around your home without any sort of logical explanation as to how they died is another sign that there's a gas line leak.
Hissing Sound
A leak in any line will usually create a sound of some sort, and natural gas is no exception. If you hear a high-pitched whistling sound in your home, see if you can detect where the leak is by listening to the volume as it gets louder. If you find out that it's next to a gas line, shut off the natural gas immediately and call a plumber to perform a gas line repair service. You may also notice that your utility bills have gone up as well since a leak in your gas line will allow energy to simply expand into the atmosphere.
Physical Distortions
The area immediately around a leak in your gas line may appear hazy or fuzzy, or it may even have a white cloud suspended above the plumbing line. If you don't see either of those, but still suspect that there's a leak in your gas line, put a few drops of water near it to see if it bubbles. If so, there's a leak that needs to be serviced as soon as possible.
For more information about gas line repair, contact a local plumber.
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