What happened

Warming and expansion of LNG in a transfer pipeline, combined with an improperly isolated pressure relief valve, caused an overpressure failure and fire fully within Freeport LNG's fenced site, forcing a complete shutdown of the terminal. The company later attributed the incident to human error; the outage cut roughly 2 billion cubic feet/day (about 17% of US LNG export capacity) for months. PHMSA required an independent root-cause analysis. This was an accidental industrial incident, not an attack.

When cited sources give different casualty, damage or spill figures for this event, they’re reported side by side above rather than merged into one number. See how confidence levels work.