No foolin’: April is safe digging month

Courtesy: Safe Electricity®

Spring showers bring May flowers but digging on your own this spring could spell big trouble.

Even if you think you could get lucky or that digging one small hole (or two) won’t matter, don’t take for granted what lines might lurk beneath the soil in your yard or easement.

Before you use that post hole digger or other unearthing tools, STOP and call 811 to request buried electric, gas, cable and other live lines in or near your yard be marked. The service is free but digging in an unmarked yard may not be.

You might think you don’t have time for that and ask yourself, what’s the worst that could happen?

YOU COULD DIE OR BECOME SERIOUSLY INJURED.

It doesn’t make that yard project quite as pressing, does it?

Other consequences of blindly digging and taking a chance? You could cause a power outage. You could hit a gas line and get burned or cause an evacuation in your neighborhood. You could be fined. If you hit a telephone line or fiber optic, you might lose your telephone, cable TV or internet service. Worse yet, it could interfere with your neighborhood’s emergency assistance technology.

Although it all seems like “your” yard, utilities have the right of way to the live lines lurking under the ground in places where you might dig. In fact, an underground utility line is damaged once every nine minutes across the nation because someone decided to dig without getting their yard properly marked, according to data collected by Common Ground Alliance. You may think one or two “small holes” won’t matter, but that’s what the person thought who hit a line nine minutes ago.

Take a deep breath, look over your landscaping or fence plans, and call 811 before you dig. Each state has its own call center to help you get digging safely (in Minnesota it’s Gopher State One Call). You might know the service in your state by a different name, but 811 is the one-call-fits-all in the U.S. By calling 811 or your state’s digging call center directly, utilities or the companies they contract with will come to your home and mark your yard before you dig.

Safe Electricity reminds you call811.com lists the name and contact information for each state’s digging notification service. The site also lists the advance notice required for marking services, which is usually two days, not including the day you call.

So tiptoe through the tulips this spring and summer, both literally and figuratively. Know what’s underneath that flower bed and everywhere else in your yard.

As call811.com says, “Know what’s below.” Then dig safely. For more about electrical safety, visit safeelectricity.org.

(Editor’s note: Gopher State One Call is not responsible for contacting locators to paint or flag your private facilities. Steele-Waseca Cooperative Electric also doesn’t locate private underground facilities that are the homeowner’s responsibility. Private underground facilities usually include any that serve outbuildings, hot tubs, security lighting, pools, and natural gas grills. Other private facilities include natural gas farm taps, private water systems, data communication lines, and invisible fences. The contact information for a number of locating companies who will locate privately owned underground facilities on your property can be found in the industry directory at www.gopherstateonecall.org/homeowners, then click on “Private Utility Locators.” This list is by no means an exhaustive list, or a list of locators recommended by GSOC. For additional locators, consult an online search engine or refer to the Yellow Pages under “Utilities Underground – Locating.” Remember, private locators will charge a fee for their services.)

 

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