Longford is a town in the

Gippsland Gippsland () is a rural region in the southeastern part of Victoria, Australia, mostly comprising the coastal plains south of the Victorian Alps (the southernmost section of the Great Dividing Range). It covers an elongated area of east of th ...

region of Victoria,

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...

. At the 2021 census, Longford and the surrounding area had a population of 1,489. It was named Longford because of the long ford across the rivers to get into Sale. It is located at the junction of the

South Gippsland Highway South Gippsland Highway is a partially divided highway connecting the south-eastern suburbs of Melbourne through the South Gippsland region of in Victoria, Australia to the town of Sale. The highway serves as a gateway from Melbourne to man ...

and the Longford-Rosedale Road, next to the

Latrobe River The Latrobe River (or sometimes La Trobe or LaTrobe) is a perennial river of the West Gippsland catchment, located in the West Gippsland region of the Australian state of Victoria. The Latrobe River and its associated sub-catchment is an impo ...

. A new bridge over the floodprone Latrobe River was completed in 2006, replacing the historic swinging bridge. The road approach to the Sale Swing Bridge was prone to flooding, cutting the road to

Sale, Victoria Sale is a city situated in the Gippsland region of Victoria, Australia and the council capital of the Shire of Wellington. It had an estimated population of 15,305 in 2022 according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics. The total population in ...

ExxonMobil plant

Oil An oil is any nonpolar chemical substance that is composed primarily of hydrocarbons and is hydrophobic (does not mix with water) and lipophilic (mixes with other oils). Oils are usually flammable and surface active. Most oils are unsaturate ...

and

natural gas Natural gas (also fossil gas, methane gas, and gas) is a naturally occurring compound of gaseous hydrocarbons, primarily methane (95%), small amounts of higher alkanes, and traces of carbon dioxide and nitrogen, hydrogen sulfide and helium ...

were discovered in the

Bass Strait Bass Strait () is a strait separating the island state of Tasmania from the Mainland Australia, Australian mainland (more specifically the coast of Victoria (Australia), Victoria, with the exception of the land border across Boundary Islet). The ...

in 1965. Nearby Sale experienced a boom period when it became the service and residential base of the

Esso Esso () is a trading name for ExxonMobil. Originally, the name was primarily used by its predecessor Standard Oil of New Jersey after the breakup of the original Standard Oil company in 1911. The company adopted the name "Esso" (from the phon ...

- BHP oil and gas exploration and development program. The unprocessed oil and gas are pumped through of undersea pipes to Longford. Here the hydrocarbons are removed and used to produce LPG, commercial-grade natural gas, and stabilised oil. The gas is piped to Melbourne and the Victorian gas grid and up to New South Wales via the Eastern gas pipeline with a branch running under Bass Strait to Tasmania and the oil to Westernport Bay and thence to

Geelong Geelong ( ) (Wathawurrung language, Wathawurrung: ''Djilang''/''Djalang'') is a port city in Victoria, Australia, located at the eastern end of Corio Bay (the smaller western portion of Port Phillip Bay) and the left bank of Barwon River (Victo ...

and Altona from where it is shipped interstate and overseas. In September 1998, a large fire at the oil and

processing plant was responsible for an almost complete shutdown of Victoria's natural gas supply for weeks thereafter. At 12:25pm on 25 September 1998, heat exchanger GP905 cracked and failed catastrophically, instantly killing two people. A

royal commission A royal commission is a major ad-hoc formal public inquiry into a defined issue in some monarchies. They have been held in the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, Norway, Malaysia, Mauritius and Saudi Arabia. In republics an equi ...

subsequently found that Esso breached health and safety rules, and was responsible for the explosion.

Chemical spill in water

PFAS Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (also PFAS, PFASs, and informally referred to as "forever chemicals") are a group of synthetic organofluorine chemical compounds that have multiple fluorine atoms attached to an alkyl chain; there are 7 millio ...

chemicals were found in groundwater at

's plant by EPA Victoria in 2017. These chemicals are known to be linked to cancer in people and animals and had an impact on local agriculture and livestock operations and sale.

References

3. ''Glimpses of Longford'' by Deanna Gunning (2010) Towns in Victoria (state) Shire of Wellington {{Gippsland-geo-stub