Gas bombs and Occam’s razor

Tuesday 30th November, 2021

Sri Lankans have a remarkable ability to forget. That may be the reason why Prabhakaran failed to achieve his goal despite all his bomb blasts on civilian targets. Zahran, in his wisdom, emulated Prabhakaran, carried out bomb attacks, but got nowhere near his goal posthumously. The local gas companies have gone a step further; they charge for causing explosions that kill people and destroy property!

It is in fear and trepidation that every Sri Lankan woman steps into her kitchen to cook up a storm as the danger of a firestorm lurks there thanks to the gas companies run by Zahran’s fat-cat cousins who have turned gas cylinders into bombs. Unlike Prabhakaran and Zahran, the gas mudalalis have benefited from Sri Lankans’ collective memory lapse. The brouhaha over gas explosions seems to have fizzled out.

The government has taken steps to have a few gas cylinders tested to find out why they cause explosions, and reports thereon have been referred to a national university. The matter has ended there to all intents and purposes. People are being urged to apply soapy water to the valves of gas cylinders they purchase to see if there are leaks. The onus has thus been shifted to the consumer! In other words, in case of a gas explosion, the consumer concerned will be blamed for not checking the valve of his or her gas cylinder properly—caveat emptor!

Hitler, wherever he may be, would feel ashamed if he knew the Sri Lankan gas company honchos have found a much easier way to snuff out lives than his huge gas chambers. The process of destroying lives here is very simple. A person walks, half-asleep, into his or her kitchen in the morning, and switches on a light … a big bang, and he or she is gone!

There has been a debate on the causes of gas explosions. Scientists have adduced several reasons. It is believed that the gas composition has been changed arbitrarily and the valves of gas cylinders, regulators, etc., cannot take the pressure of the new mix, and therefore they develop leaks, endangering the lives of the people. But, we, as laymen, prefer to adopt the philosophical rule—Occam’s razor, or the principle that the simplest explanation is usually the best one—in dealing with the ‘gas bomb’ issue.

The real problem, in our book, is the leaky valves of gas cylinders. No gas cylinder with a defective valve or any other defect must be allowed to leave the factory, but many of them have entered the market. Obviously, there has been a very serious lapse on the part of those responsible for testing cylinders; they and their superiors must be held accountable for allowing safety standards to be compromised, and endangering the lives of consumers. What has really caused the gas cylinder valves to develop defects is a matter that should be dealt with separately.

What needs to be done urgently is to suspend the sale of gas and interdict all those in key positions of the state-owned gas company for their collective failure to ensure the safety of the gas cylinders they sell. Otherwise, they will cover their tracks, and it will be well-nigh impossible to figure out how the unsafe gas cylinders entered the market. The culprits must be prosecuted for criminal negligence or wilfully changing the butane-propane ratio, exposing the public to danger, as claimed by some experts.

The precedent created by the Presidential Commission of Inquiry (PCoI), which probed the Easter Sunday blasts should be adopted in apportioning the blame for the kitchen gas bombs, as it were. The PCoI says, in its report, the entire yahapalana government including the President and the Prime Minister must be held accountable for the blasts in 2019. Similarly, the incumbent government, which came to power promising to prevent blasts and save lives, the President and the Prime Minister must be held accountable for the gas bombs that turn kitchens into infernos.