Hit 500 tree removals this week and one number stood out

I tracked my last 500 removals and 87 of them had some kind of utility conflict we caught last minute. That is almost 1 in 6 jobs where we could have hit a line if we skipped the locate. How many close calls have you all logged this year?

3 comments

3 Comments

alexc931mo ago

My buddy runs a crew in Ohio and told me they had a near miss last fall where a utility locate flagged a gas line that was completely unmarked on the old maps. He said if they had gone in blind they would have taken out a main feed for half the neighborhood. Makes you wonder how many close calls people just don't talk about.

jamie_white1mo ago

And see, that's the thing that gets me @alexc93. Your buddy's crew got lucky because they had a utility locate out there. But how many small crews or guys doing side work skip that step to save a few bucks? I bet it's way more than anyone wants to admit. Those old maps are basically guesswork in some areas, especially if the original utility company went under or got bought out decades ago. That whole system relies on people being honest and careful, and we all know how that goes sometimes. One bad swing of a shovel and you're not just fixing a pipe, you're explaining to the news why half a street has no gas.

graceblack1mo ago

One bad swing of a shovel" is all it takes, man. Scary stuff.