Delivery of the Russian gas to Finland was suspended for six hours because of an explosion at a main gas pipeline in Vsevolozhsky District, Leningrad Region.

As REGNUM was told at the press office of the Gasum gas company (Finland), the gas delivery was restored today at about 06:00 a.m. According to the press office, Gazprom immediately informed the Finnish partners about the accident.

Finland has no extra gas reserves apart from the one in the pipeline, but majority of major customers in Finland could resort to alternative types of fuel, for instance oil. At the moment of the accident, there were about 11mn cubic meters of gas in the Finnish section of the pipeline.

The gas pipeline exploded near the village of Belousovo, Leningrad Region, at 00:05 a.m. on July 26. Fire brigades managed to localize the fire at 01:21 a.m. According to the local emergency ministry department, nobody was hurt.

Gasum is an energy company delivering natural gas from Russia to Finland. Now, the gas networks of the company are about 1,000 km long. Gasum is co-owned by Gazprom (25%), Fortum (Finland, 25%), Ruhrgas (Germany, 20%), the Finnish government (24%) and Finnish timber industry companies M-Real, Stora Enso and UPM-Kymmene, each of them having by 2% of Gasum shares.
sections: Society, Accidents, Region News
areas: North-West region