This is why you call for locates! job complete

[rbh]

Two days ago we were called in to a customers trailer park because three quarters of the residents phones went dead,
They had been putting in a new trailer up in the origanal park, and had to extend the power.
This is what happens when a digging bar goes through conduit and a good portion of a 100 pr cable.

at least I know what I have lined up for work next week.

Well finally we got it done, we are just doing a cut over from the old cable to the new.

 

[angus63]

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Can you hear me now??????

 

[ehenry]

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Thats a fiber line isnt it?

 

[rbh]

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Thats a fiber line isnt it?

nope, good old copper 100pr 24 ga cel.
most people dont realize it but years ago (before fiber and T1 spans) you would go 120.000 feet+ on copper with just neg 47vdc for talk voltage, but you had to put in load coils every 6000 feet so you could understand the guy at the other end.

 

[SS MAYFLOAT]

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I know in Ohio, dial 811 before you dig anywhere. Its the law. Your pics are proof of why it is the law. For me, many times the utilities have found stuff that wasn't marked. Sure does save lots of time on your project when you do things right.

 

[avenger79]

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eh wrap it up with elec tape. should be good as new. LOL

 

[Bucks45]

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I worked for a few years as a manager for the telephone company, but I worked for their cable t.v. division. I spent the majority of my time trying to get customers phone lines fixed after contractors cut them while burying cable drops.

 

[marlboro180]

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rbh- Been there, done that:redface:Gas lines , power, geez....Expensive repairs!

Big oops !

Here we have Diggers Hotline - they are pretty good, but sometimes they miss stuff. I still break out the divining rods to check, especially on private utilities as Diggers does not private sewer or little runs to a garage from the house, etc.

 

[Bob_VT]

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I have seen many of those repaired when I did road work..... we used to carry a splice kit with us if we hit a residential feed but dig-safe would mark the main lines for free.

HUGE HUGE fine if you cut one and had not contacted them.

 

[kenmyfam]

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eh wrap it up with elec tape. should be good as new. LOL

Going to need a lot of marettes for that one !!!

 

[Tim Frank]

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Do the utilities charge back the repair work?

 

[rbh]

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Do the utilities charge back the repair work?

The owner of the park owns the cable, I am the origanal eng/builder of this cable plant/ park. It just took one electrian to mess up this one.

 

[dave11]

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That's gonna be expensive!

 

[wajajaja02]

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my career at njb for about 12 years was all about emergency isolation and restoration of these mini disasters. about 3 per day. kept a team of 6 of us quite busy just making dispatch, and follow up. and well paid.

 

[DianneB]

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Going to need a lt of marettes for that one !!!

Don't even JOKE about Marettes! When someone had the engine out of my Sylvan years ago, they put it back in using Marettes on all the wires. Now I get to re-do it the RIGHT way!

Being in the Communications department of a large power utility we hear lots about dig-ins and "backhoe fade" even though our standard depth is 5 feet. The lucky ones dig in to a communications cable and it only costs them thousands of dollars. The unlucky ones dig in to a power cable and don't have to worry about paying the repair costs.

 

[kenmyfam]

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Don't even JOKE about Marettes! When someone had the engine out of my Sylvan years ago, they put it back in using Marettes on all the wires. Now I get to re-do it the RIGHT way!

I think there are a lot of folk here that have experienced one or more of those jobs !!

 

[Moody Blue]

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Locates are not always 100% either. Last week a contractor struck and broke a main high pressure natural gas line in a town just north of me. The area was properly surveyed and marked but the gas line was not identified. Hundreds of people were evacuated for over 5 hours while it was repaired.

 

[Summer Fun]

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Back in my younger days. I was digging in a farmers field and hit a 8in cable.
It shut down a local airbase's radar and other stuff.
The farmer owned his place for 30yrs and never knew it was there.

I almost went to prison for that. . I was told if I ever said anything they'd have my butt.
The base is now shut down.

 

[SS MAYFLOAT]

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Locates are not always 100% either. Last week a contractor struck and broke a main high pressure natural gas line in a town just north of me. The area was properly surveyed and marked but the gas line was not identified. Hundreds of people were evacuated for over 5 hours while it was repaired.

They may not find everything, but once you call the proper utilities they become liable if they fail to locate.

A similar incident happened at a near by country club. All the utilitiy people came and surveyed and marked their lines. They too hit a high pressure gas line that was not marked. Gas crew told the superintendant that if he had not called, the club would have had to pay for repair and the lost gas.

 

[OldePharte]

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A number of years ago, I was at a customer's job site. The Telephone people had done their locate; they lost the signal in the tone line, but picked it up again. So, they mark the line. The contractor dug about 10 feet away and in the second bucketful, up came what had to have been a 500 pair phone cable. That sucker was huge!

Come to find out that who ever did the cable install made a huge loop in this area and it wasn't marked on the phone company construction paperwork.

Our guy was in the clear on this one.

Same company was conducting some test drilling prior a large sewer job and hit a large water line. The road intersection looked like a plate of spaghetti with all the color locate markings, but this line was not marked. The city came out and closed every valve that they could find. Didn't slow the flow one bit. Meanwhile we got road flooding, basement flooding from all the water. Two days later, two days, we find out that the line fed the local air base 4 or 5 miles south. The line ran from it's own well field some 20 miles north through several different cities and none had any idea that this 20 inch line even existed.