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If you smell gas right now, stop reading after this paragraph. Do not flip a light switch, do not use your phone inside the house, do not unplug or plug in anything. Get everyone, including pets, out of the house immediately, leave the door open behind you, and once you're a safe distance away, outside and away from the building, call 911 and SoCalGas's 24/7 emergency line. The steps below walk through this in order, but the short version is: out first, calls from outside, no exceptions.
Follow these six steps in order, without skipping ahead to the ones that feel less urgent:
A few of these are worth repeating on their own, because they're the mistakes that turn a leak into an explosion risk:
A gas leak announces itself in three ways: the rotten-egg smell of the odorant added to natural gas, a hissing sound near a line or appliance, and physical signs like dead vegetation over a buried gas run. The smell is the one most people notice first, and it is the one to act on immediately.
Natural gas smells like rotten eggs or sulfur. The gas itself is odorless; utilities add a chemical called mercaptan specifically so that a leak announces itself. If you notice that smell anywhere in or around your house, treat it as a possible gas leak, not something to investigate further before acting.
The smell is the most common signal, but a few other signs are worth knowing, especially outdoors near a buried gas line:
If you notice any of these along with a smell, treat it the same way: leave, then call from a safe distance.
A gas smell in the house means gas is escaping somewhere between the meter and an appliance, and the source is usually one of four things: a burner or pilot light that has gone out, a loose connection at an appliance, a failing flex connector behind a stove or dryer, or a fault in the line itself. You do not need to work out which one before acting. Leave first, call from outside, and let the utility identify it.
A slight gas smell in the house is treated exactly the same way as a strong one. People routinely talk themselves out of acting on a faint smell, and that is the dangerous version of this situation, because a small leak in a closed room becomes a large problem over hours. There is no threshold below which “I smell gas in my house” stops being worth a phone call.
One exception worth naming: a rotten egg smell in the house with no gas present is often sewer gas rather than natural gas, and it usually comes from a dry drain trap or a venting fault. It is not an emergency in the same way. If the smell is localised to a drain, a bathroom that has gone unused, or a floor drain, that is the likelier explanation. When you are not certain which one you are smelling, treat it as natural gas and leave.
Once you're outside and at a safe distance, call both of these, not just one:
Once SoCalGas or the fire department has investigated and confirmed it's safe to return, a few things typically follow:
Some situations aren't a sudden, strong smell. They're a faint odor that only shows up near one appliance, a gas bill that's climbed with no clear reason, or a hissing sound that comes and goes. If you're not sure whether what you're noticing rises to the level of “leave the house now,” the safer assumption is always to treat it as an emergency and follow the steps above.
But once an active emergency has been ruled out, either by the utility's own visit or because the situation is clearly a low-level, ongoing concern rather than a sudden strong smell, that's a case where non-invasive gas leak detection can help pin down exactly where a suspected leak is coming from, using tracer-gas and electronic detection methods, without digging blindly to look for it.
That's a distinct service from what's described above, and it's covered on our gas leak detection page. It is never the right response to an active emergency. If there's any doubt, the doubt resolves toward 911 and SoCalGas, not toward scheduling a visit.
Natural gas has no smell of its own. What you notice is mercaptan, an odorant added deliberately so that a leak is detectable long before it is dangerous, and it is usually described as rotten eggs or sulphur.
That is what a gas leak smells like in a house, and the strength of it is the guide to what to do:
If SoCalGas has been out, made the property safe, and confirmed the leak is on your side of the meter, that is the point at which we can help. A slow leak in a buried or concealed line is located with tracer gas: an inert gas is introduced into the drained line and detected at the surface where it escapes, which is what finds a leak too small to hear.
That visit is a flat-rate fee agreed before we arrive, the no-find-no-fee guarantee applies if we cannot locate it, any repair comes as a written quote afterwards, and the repair carries a 2-year workmanship warranty.
Being direct about this boundary matters on a page like this one:
¿Prefiere leer esto en español? ¿Huele a gas? Qué hacer ahora mismo.
Everyone out first. Nothing electric. Call from a safe distance outside.
911Emergency responders 1-800-427-2200SoCalGas 24/7 emergency lineThese are not us. We are a leak-detection company, not the gas utility and not an emergency responder.
For a suspected slow or hidden gas leak, once an active emergency has been ruled out, we offer a non-invasive locate visit, Monday to Saturday.
See Gas Leak DetectionMost people describe it as similar to rotten eggs or sulfur. That smell comes from mercaptan, a chemical added to naturally odorless natural gas specifically so a leak is noticeable.
Don’t stop to open windows, and don’t use anything electric to do it. Leave first. Getting everyone out quickly matters more than ventilating on your way out.
Only if the shutoff valve is immediately at hand on your way out and doing so doesn’t mean staying inside any longer. If reaching it means delaying your exit or investigating further, leave first and let SoCalGas or the fire department handle the shutoff.
There’s no fixed timeframe, since it depends entirely on what the utility or fire department finds. Don’t go back in until they tell you directly that it’s safe.
Treat it as a possible gas leak and follow the steps above. A gas leak is not something to wait and see about, and there’s no downside to a false alarm compared to the risk of ignoring a real one.
No. We locate suspected gas leaks non-invasively. Gas-line and gas-appliance repair is licensed gas-fitting work, performed by SoCalGas or a licensed gas-fitting contractor, not by us.
That’s the kind of situation our non-invasive gas leak detection can help with, once an active emergency has genuinely been ruled out. See our gas leak detection page for how that visit works. If you’re at all unsure whether your situation is urgent, treat it as urgent and call 911 and SoCalGas first.
No. An active gas leak goes to 911 and SoCalGas’s 24/7 emergency line, not to us. We schedule non-emergency, suspected-slow-leak locate visits during our Monday through Saturday hours, the same as our other detection services.