Call before you dig

[part-time-Farmer-NC]

I ran into a similar situation a few years ago. No Cuts was called out to mark the lines, they guy who did the work didn't/couldn't check the fiber going into our building. Remote users were dead in much of their job. No email/no file server etc.

They spent the next day and a half splicing the line back together.

That incident pushed the next wave of equipment purchases into the could. Cloud servers/equipment/access is way higher than onsite and still has it's outage issues.

 

[paulsharvey]

I ran into a similar situation a few years ago. No Cuts was called out to mark the lines, they guy who did the work didn't/couldn't check the fiber going into our building. Remote users were dead in much of their job. No email/no file server etc.

They spent the next day and a half splicing the line back together.

That incident pushed the next wave of equipment purchases into the could. Cloud servers/equipment/access is way higher than onsite and still has it's outage issues.

Generally, Utilities are only required to locate to the Point of Service, which is generally the meter, sewer clean-out, ect. From that point to the building (or whatever), is on You as the contractor or property owner. So, a typical home, with UG power, they locate to the meter, but if you have dual panels, on in an out building, that's Not their Utility, it's yours. Same with water, once that water passes their meter, it's your water and your water line.

There are private locate companies for that, but it is Expensive ($800 or more generally), and isn't part of 811 (in my part id the world)

 

[orezok]

Some areas require "low impact marking", we did some on Florida State University campus, and we had to use chalk paint, and biodegradable marking flags. Everyone is supposed to use fading paint, but some of our local counties and city water/sewer departments use a perm oil based, so that it's easier to locate next time. Our bigger semi local gas outfit (TECO) also has glue down yellow medallions that put on the curb at road crossings

I had location done at my house for electric. The locator did the mark out, but then painted this large diatribe on the ground as how chalk paint was used and would quickly disappear. Unfortunately he apparently couldn’t read the label on the can and used standard oil based paint.

Took me a while to “erase” the paint marks on my concrete drive.

 

[chim]

All better than the European thing of running into bombs underground.

Bruce

Uhhh, we did projects at Aberdeen Proving Ground. Plenty of surprises there. According to rumor, they were running low on acreage for new buildings, so they appropriated an old test range. Foundations take longer when the excavator can only skim 6" between "sweeps".

 

[paulsharvey]

I worked on a project, relocating a high profile fiber, for a road widening project. Guys are neck deep in mud trying to do the tie ins between two bores. Don't think much about it. Couple days later, I was looking over the plans again, and see a note; absolutely no off-site water discharge allowed due to high levels of Cesium-137... No idea why there is radioactive material on the side of the road.

 

[orezok]

Years ago and operator of a scraper told me that he was doing a project with a 637 at the Yuma test range. He looked back to see if he had a full load and saw several munitions sticking out of the top of the load. Stopped, jumped off the scraper and ran as fast as he could. Oops.

 

[RjCorazza]

Years ago and operator of a scraper told me that he was doing a project with a 637 at the Yuma test range. He looked back to see if he had a full load and saw several munitions sticking out of the top of the load. Stopped, jumped off the scraper and ran as fast as he could. Oops.

Back in the early 90's we got a day permit to hike somewhere on the Yuma Proving Grounds, and that wouldn't surprise me at all. The amount of spent munitions, rocket or missile parts, and other military debris was amazing. I think I still have a 50 cal casing that was stamped in 1944 (forget the actual stamp, but my "guide" said it was from WW2 Training).

 

[azbinder]

Back in the early 90's we got a day permit to hike somewhere on the Yuma Proving Grounds, and that wouldn't surprise me at all. The amount of spent munitions, rocket or missile parts, and other military debris was amazing. I think I still have a 50 cal casing that was stamped in 1944 (forget the actual stamp, but my "guide" said i was from WW2

Back in the early 90's we got a day permit to hike somewhere on the Yuma Proving Grounds, and that wouldn't surprise me at all. The amount of spent munitions, rocket or missile parts, and other military debris was amazing. I think I still have a 50 cal casing that was stamped in 1944 (forget the actual stamp, but my "guide" said it was from WW2 Training).

In the late 70's I was working on a cotton farm in SW Arizona. Boss's son has a farm about 12 miles N of Dateland, AZ. He was irrigating one day, shoveling some rows over and hit something metalic. Dug it up and held it on his arm while he scraped it off with his shovel. Saw some markings on it, "US Army Anti-Tank Mine". Dick laid it down very carefully, and RAN like hell. Called the YPG in Yuma and they said that they would not do anything about it, so he called the AZ DPS and the came out and picked it up. Where he was farming was on the grounds of Gen. Patton's Army Desert Corp training grounds from WWII.

 

[Fallon]

We've trenched in the yard a few times without locating my stuff, but did have 811 do their thing. First time between the house & the barn over the top of the water, power & phone lines up to the barn. Weren't to worried about hitting them as we were replacing the power line & dropping a new conduit for data/phone in. Surprisingly we didn't cut those lines. Did go through the downspout pipe though, but we knew that was going to happen. Was easier to repair that than avoid it. 2nd time years later the well 30' from the house died due to wiring issues between the house & well. That pipe & wire ran perpendicular under the previous wiring we'd put in. They used a vac truck to excavate down about 2' through all the other conduit & wiring without breaking anything.

 

[orezok]

About 15 years ago, I was tearing down and replacing a High School in Indio CA. The electric that ran through the entire site was 4160v. While location was able to locate all of it, we potholed numerous locations using vacuum trucks. No shovels for this kind of project.