Fire trucks and orange cones lined Crescent View Avenue in Cape Elizabeth Tuesday evening as the town’s fire department responded to a gas leak at an old farmhouse.

According to Deputy Fire Chief Mike Jordan, the source of the leak was a gas tank that had been in the ground almost 40 years. The tank had rusted through and the ground water pushed the gas up to the surface, leaving a sheen on the puddles lining Crescent View Avenue.

Jordan said the safety hazards were minimal. “Mainly, we want to keep people from playing in the water,” he said. According to Jordan, had the ground still been frozen, the gas would have seeped back under the surface, and no one would have noticed the leak.

A vacuum truck was brought in from Portland in order to remove the gas from the road. Ann Hemenway, of the Department of Environmental Protection, reported to the scene to survey the situation. She said it was hard to tell at this point what steps would have to be taken, but the first would be to remove the tank and determine whether or not gas leaked into the soil. If so, it would have to be dug out, she said.

The farmhouse at 1 Crescent View Ave. was owned by the family of Robin Clough for almost 50 years. Clough called the situation “rather ironic” because the residence went under contract with new owners just two days before the incident, which for Clough marked “the end of an era.”

“We’ll do the right thing,” Clough said. “I’m glad it happened to me and not them.”

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