Chuck
Get that man in contact with Mythbusters! They did a test of that exact theory, and concluded that someone smoking in a Port-a-John would suffocate before there was enough gas in the thing to blow. :-)
From the article...
"The lawsuit says the cigarette ignited methane gas leaking from a pipe underneath the unit."
The portapotty was at a landfill. I would expect that a commercial NG pipe would have had mercaptan and would have obviously been filled with gas, and that the landfill gas would probably have smelled worse. Of course ambient smell and the smell in the john itself would have make the latter less obvious. Not to mention the smoker may have a limited sense of smell, anyway. Pure methane, of course, is odorless.
File this one under "it can happen anywhere, anytime, to anyone."
Tom Koszuta
It said he had some permanent disfigurement......I wonder what was disfigured? Maybe I don't want to know. :-)
Chuck
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