You ever noticed how "oh, we'll get this done real quick" can lead to so much trouble? Well I knew it would happen sooner or later. First utility hit! Enjoy and happy thanksgiving! YouTube - OOPS!!
That looked like a cable TV line. I have cut those with a shovel. I always call the locate people before we do a job but sometimes it just happens.
I couldn't believe how shallow they install those cables. As soon as the bucket came up and I saw that orange cable I was like DOH! :Banghead :bash
Even the phone lines are like that here.Maybe 3 inches deep..... Love the editing :lmao
I've cut TV cable edging landscape beds by hand. I think they roll the sod over em and call it good. Even the dog fences are deeper. What I've always wondered is how they get the sprinkler lines under those big old tree stumps for the grinder to find. Those little plastic lines flow a lot of water.
I worked a job once digging up buried stumps on a building lot, there were sinkholes developing big enough to swallow a child. I had the job marked out for utilities and was stunned when I cut the TV cable just by lowering the stabilizer of my backhoe I called it in, the cable company came and repaired it at no charge. Building code here requires that utilities be buried a minimum of 18 inches.
I never had much concern about their service lines.Their corporate strategy seems to be conceal the wire and if it gets damaged we will come out and repair it.I really think that it pays off for them considering how much more it would cost to do it "right" and and the wire is not really a hazard aside from the heart attacks that we get when we grab it.A lot of phone services are now in the cables with the TV and Internet that is a package deal with a lot of cable companies so the customer can lose a lot when the cable is broken.I have had the repair guys tell me pretty much what I just wrote here,maybe it is job security for them .Ron G
I have a stump grinding machine and have hit phone cables 6" undere the ground,beware disclaimers etc mean nothing to utility companys its "you broke it you pay" I have a disclaimer on my quotes but it doesnt do much if the client wont pay in the first instance.
Did a house basement addition and had the utilities marked out and we hand dug up three that were marked, ran a half day and counted four separate wires we dug up that were not marked, seems every time someone hit it in the past they just put in another entire line, by weeks end we dug up over nine separate wires and a few cable's as well, the shallowest was three inches the deepest was 5 ft, we found later they buried it in the same trench they put the waterline in and that wasn't where they said it was supposed to be either, its bad when they the city guys say, when you find the line let us know we are not sure but we think its here, I asked about the sewer lines, the answer was we have no idea, how about the water main, the answer was, we think its in front of the house and not in the back, thats the best you can do is narrow it down by 125ft, the answer was yes, when you hit it let us know where you find it at and we'll mark it on our maps! The best one yet for that job is when I asked where the water shut off is located, the answer was, if we knew where the main was we might be able to tell you where the shut off is located but we know we covered them up to keep people from hitting them, you guys covered the water shut offs up with ground? how are we supposed to find them to uncover them so we can shut off the water if we hit the waterline, the answer was simple, we don't know, we never thought about that before?? And to think I wasn't sure if I was qualified to work on such technical projects, good god, a kidergartner is smarter than some of these city workers. So we commenced digging an entire alley up to find the water shut off they buried before we dug for the house project, spent a half day looking for it before we found it where they said it wasn't, the answer I got afterwards was, gosh I didn't think we left it there? After that we didn't get too shook up over hitting lines and cables, if nobody showed up to fix it it must not be any good and since nobody showed to fix anything apparently theres a lot of cables buried that go nowhere, I personally thing if they put them in they should be responsible to take them back out once they are no longer used but that didn't win any brownie points with the utilities guys either. Do the one call, document the marked areas with pictures and go dig, if nobody shows up and is upset you hit their sh*t then its probably no good anyhow or its a private deal and don't worry about it.
I'm glad this happened in my own back yard so i could see the process without a customer standing over me. The cable company is supposed to come in the next few days to bury the line and it will be really interesting to talk with the guys doing the work to see if they have heard that the policy is to just bury them shallow with the expectation they will be hit and replaced. We will see.