Photo By Eric Pilgrim | Johnny Bailey (right) and Patrick Medley switch primary regulators at one of 54...... read more read more
FORT KNOX, Ky. — Those who interact with the Operations and Maintenance Gas Shop know the six men who work there operate like a well-oiled machine.
Now, Fort Knox’s in-house experts for all natural gas issues have the street credentials to back up that claim after they earned the 2025 Army Industrial Operations Safety Award for Excellence in Safety at U.S. Army Materiel Command on Jan 26.
“This team demonstrated exceptional technical proficiency and cost-stewardship by performing complex maintenance and design on natural gas lines internally,” said Fort Knox Safety officer Garvin Purtteman, “including the successful construction of a secondary regulator station to replace failing infrastructure.”
Purtteman said the team has a zero-mishap record for the past several years. In fact, he couldn’t find any incidence of a mishap after a comprehensive background search.
“Given the high-risk nature of natural gas operations, their ability to maintain a flawless safety record while executing critical infrastructure projects makes them an ideal candidate for AMC recognition,” said Purtteman.
Proof of their accomplishments is found in the numbers.
“The Gas Shop has been instrumental in managing high pressure gas mains and components supporting 2,382 homes, multiple commands, partners, and support buildings, including the ranges,” according to the award nomination. “Their work covers 102 miles of gas mains and thousands of service lines, and they grease and operate 695 steel valves and 385 poly valves on the mainline.
“Personnel maintain, test, and keep records for the 54 district regulator stations, 108 regulators, 108 pressure gauges, 105 pressure relief valves, 200 risers, 1,582 service regulators, and [they] perform over 400 locates each year.”
Gas Shop team supervisor Derrick Peters said their 400 gas-line locates only account for what units and organizations have requested each year. They also perform at least 100 more from housing fences.
“Somebody moves out, they take the fence down; somebody else moves in, they put up a new one,” said Peters. “Altogether it’s about 500 locates that we actually do each year.”
Peters organizes their projects based on seasonal and critical needs. For instance, valves are checked and maintained or replaced in the spring.
“That consists of greasing valves, marking valves, cleaning the boxes out and painting them so we can find them later,” said Peters.
Now that that project is complete, they are working on the regulator stations:
“We’re adjusting the pressures on the regulators. This takes about roughly eight weeks to do this project, and then we’ll move on to other projects,” said Peters. “It’s a pretty busy job.”
All this effort and more comes with a built-in purpose: safety: something they take very seriously. Their success rate is a tribute to it, according to Jay Schmidt, chief of DPW’s Operations and Maintenance Division. He is the one who nominated them for the award and offered a great example of why they deserve it:
On May 15, the men of the Gas Shop team were called in after hours to avert a potential major crisis.
“Through rigorous testing, the team discovered that our incoming natural gas was missing mercaptan – the additive that provides the warning smell for gas leaks,” said Schmidt. “They traced the failure back to the Texas Gas system, immediately contacted the supplier to force a fix, and then bled our entire installation's lines to ensure the warning odor was restored.”
Schmidt said without the distinctive odor mixed into natural gas, someone could forget to turn off their stove, or a leak could form in a line, and nobody would know it until it was too late.
“Safety is their primary responsibility, and they do it exceptionally well. No one sees the underground gas lines, but everyone on this base enjoys the heating, cooling and cooking it provides,” said Schmidt. “This team is truly an unsung hero, and I am incredibly proud of their work.”
Peters said while it feels good to be recognized, they don’t need it.
“We do this to keep the post safe, and everyone here safe,” said Peters. “Those are our biggest concerns; everyone here is safe and then we all go home at the end of the day because it is a dangerous job dealing with high pressure gas lines.”
| Date Taken: | 05.22.2026 |
| Date Posted: | 05.22.2026 15:03 |
| Story ID: | 566027 |
| Location: | FORT KNOX, KENTUCKY, US |
| Web Views: | 16 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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