Wednesday, April 23, 2014

I broke a waterline last week

It wasn't marked and no-one even knew it was there. I was exposing our conduit and stuck a side tooth through the pipe.

It took then forever to find the right valve,,, and another couple hours to discover they forgot to turn off the back-flow preventer.
We couldn't get all the water out of the hole because the conduit was acting like a dam, so I went in (up to my knees in water) and dug under the conduit.

After we got the pipe fixed, I had to buy a new pair of boots as the others took three days to dry.
When I was wearing those new boots, my left heel started hurting- which I attributed to new boots.

Turns out that it's the way I'm sitting on the backhoe while gingerly feeling for unknown utilities.

4 comments:

  1. I get strange pains in my neck, when I'm on a crane, the lift is tedious and the sun is in my eyes.

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  2. Time to duct tape a chunk of pool noodle on that edge.

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  3. Be happy it wasn't an unknown electrical circuit!

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    Replies
    1. I hit it when i was cleaning around the concrete infill of our primary.

      So far I've found three water lines and a gas line that they had no idea was there- neither did the locators.
      I just had a feeling because of the valve box I uncovered next to the trench and the gas meter next to the building that I'd find something.

      Maybe I need to get into the utility marking business, because I'm better than the ones getting $100/hr that only look at prints.

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