If Undertaking Excavation Work, It Is Best Practice To Use Line Search Before U Dig

In Great Britain, there are approximately four million excavation projects taking place every year – 77,000 every week. During the course of these, on average there are 60,000 cases each year of a contractor striking a utility of one sort or another, often causing serious injury to the worker. Some utilities such as telecoms, for example, are not so likely to cause injury, but striking an electricity cable or gas pipe is quite the opposite. There are a dozen or so fatalities each year.

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What are the Benefits of Becoming a EUSR Trained Surveyor?

One of the most well-known and popular skills platforms is the Energy and Utility Skills Register (EUSR). This body, which handles water, waste management, gas and electricity, provides training and skills for the energy and utility sector based on approved national standards.

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What Does Being a Utility Surveyor Involve

There are all types of job roles in this world. Some, like doctors, policemen or teachers, come with universal recognition of their importance. Others, like utility surveyors, are less known but still incredibly important for society.

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We Are The Sole UK Distributor For The Mala Easy Locator HDR

Sygma Solutions is the foremost provider of cable avoidance training in the UK, with our trainers having a combined experience of cable avoidance when excavating of over 100 years. There is nothing that we don’t know about locating and identifying underground services – and that includes the limitations of the CAT and Genny, the main tools for the location of services. Unfortunately, they do have some limitations and it is essential if you are required to locate services, that you fully understand what those limitations are. If you do not, you could make a mistake and believe that the area in which an excavation needs to take place is free of any services when the opposite is true.

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Proper Training In The Use Of The CAT And Genny Is Essential

Between 2012 and 2017 the Health & Safety Executive (HSE) received 6,746 reports of incidents concerning damage to pipelines and the escape of flammable substances liable to cause harm. Remember that this is only concerning strikes of pipelines with flammable substances. It is just one figure out of many other strikes of underground services because there are water pipes, electricity cables, telecoms, fibreoptics, sewage pipes, and more.

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Strategies and Best Practices for Cable Avoidance

A number of organisations and construction firms have provided guidance on cable avoidance and electrical safety, which is suitable for a wide range of applications.

Today, there’s no excuse for improper cable detection and avoidance practices to be followed. And the dangers of incompetency are more than clear from the thousands of accidents that occur each year, sometimes resulting in fatalities in the worst cases.

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Stay Safe with Online Cable Avoidance Training During Covid-19

Online learning has become increasingly common in the age of Covid-19. While the specific lockdowns and restrictions will hopefully abate with time, the impact on behaviour and societal fears will still persist and people will continue to appreciate the freedom to study remotely, from anywhere.

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Challenges Faced by the Cable Avoidance Industry

An underground service strike can lead to injury or loss of life, while the financial consequences can also be substantial.

To help minimise this risk, the cable avoidance industry has evolved over the years with new technology and processes to improve how underground cables are detected.

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The Many Reasons Why You Need A Cable-Avoidance Course

What is the most dangerous part of constructing a new building? Is it the height? Is it the design? Is it the floor? Is it the roofing system? Is it the electrics? Anything else?

Well, all of those things are vitally important, of course. And a lot more besides. But we believe that the most dangerous part of constructing a building starts right at the bottom. That is not on the earth surface itself, but below the surface.

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The Importance Of Training For Utility Detection Equipment And Surveying

Causing damage to underground services during the course of a project can have severe repercussions. Not the least of these is the risk of injury – which can be serious and is sometimes fatal – but it can cause delays to the project, environmental damage, and incur considerable costs. It can also severely harm the reputation of the contractor concerned. All of these are very sound reasons for following the guidelines of the HSE in its publication HSG47 (Third edition) published in 2014 which is entirely concerned with the avoidance of striking underground services. One of its’ key points is that underground services are widespread and that you should assume they are present unless you have been shown otherwise.

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