{"id":163,"date":"2015-11-27T07:26:11","date_gmt":"2015-11-27T03:26:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/monitori.ge\/en\/saving\/"},"modified":"2022-10-11T15:49:39","modified_gmt":"2022-10-11T11:49:39","slug":"saving","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/monitori.ge\/en\/saving\/","title":{"rendered":"Saving Money at a Natural Gas Pump Costs Lives"},"content":{"rendered":"

Koba Jikia was just doing his job, pumping natural gas into cars at a rural filling station in the Republic of Georgia.<\/p>\n

Then a car pulled up that had an illegal, homemade gas cylinder. As the 32-year-old Jikia began filling the tank, it exploded. The force of the explosion was so strong, it blew the tank into Jikia and his arms and legs were ripped from his body and his heart was pushed out through his back.<\/p>\n

\"The
The parents of Kobe Jikia, who was killed while filling up a car with natural gas.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

“I was standing next to him, but the cylinder passed by me and hit him,” said his friend, Papuna Gegechkori.  “I turned around to find Koba, God rest his soul, ripped in half. The cylinder flew all the way to a nearby schoolyard.”<\/p>\n

There are more than one million motor vehicles in Georgia<\/a> and it is estimated that between 10 to 30 percent of them use natural gas. Using natural gas to power a car saves from 40 to 60 percent in fuel costs in a poor country where those few dollars saved make a big difference. A majority of commercial taxis, passenger vans and delivery trucks use natural gas.<\/p>\n

But a Studio Monitori video investigation found there are many more accidents like Jikia\u2019s that are waiting to happen.  The regulatory environment is so bad that the Ministry of Economics could not even identify which of its agencies is responsible for regulating the use of natural gas. Other findings were:<\/p>\n