About 20 people had to leave their homes in a West Hartford neighborhood Thursday morning because of a gas leak, a fire official said.
The leak happened at roughly 8:30 a.m., when a contractor working on a connection at a Ballard Street house struck a gas line, Battalion Chief John Sokolowski said.
First responders evacuated homes in the immediate area and broadened the evacuation area when they realized there was a lag time in getting CNG to shut off the flow of gas, he said. Homes as far as Middlebrook Road to the south and Asylum Avenue to the north were added to the evacuation area as a precaution.