April is National Safe Digging Month. Call 8-1-1 before you dig to find any underground utilities that could endanger you.
Press Release
As yards begin to bloom, some may have an eye on those long put-off gardening projects. Rocky Mountain Power urges customers to call 8-1-1 two days before doing any digging in their yards, even for something as simple as planting a tree.
“Installing a mailbox or post for a deck or planting a tree are among the many commonplace projects that should trigger a call to 8-1-1,” said Jeremy Gee, Rocky Mountain Power’s director of health and safety. “Those may seem like simple, harmless maintenance projects, but the hazards are very real. Hitting a buried electric line could even be fatal. It’s that simple.”
With a call to the national toll-free Call Before You Dig phone number, utility location professionals will come and identify any underground utilities that could prove hazardous to your work.
A national survey recently found that 45 percent of residents planning a digging project fail to call 8-1-1. That means thousands will put themselves and their communities at risk by not calling 8-1-1 a few days beforehand to learn the approximate location of underground utilities.
The national public opinion survey of homeowners conducted in March by the Common Ground Alliance (CGA), the national association dedicated to protecting underground utility lines and the people who dig near them, also revealed the most popular planned projects cited among surveyed homeowners who plan to dig include:
- Planting a tree or shrub (47 percent)
- Building a patio or deck (24 percent)
- Building a fence (21 percent)
- Installing a mailbox (8 percent)
There are nearly 20 million miles of underground utility lines in the United States. These buried facilities, including gas, water, sewer, cable TV, high-speed Internet, landline telephone, provide the services Americans depend on for their basic everyday needs.
It’s important to know where they are buried, as well as be aware of any overhead lines, before you start your project. Even if you are lucky enough to not be harmed, you could be responsible for causing a service outage in your neighborhood—and potentially be responsible for the substantial repair costs.
The 8-1-1 service is free and connects a caller from anywhere in the country to the appropriate local one-call center, which alerts local underground facility owners so they can mark the approximate location of their lines with paint or flags. To learn more about electrical safety or to order free electrical safety materials, visit rockymountainpower.net.
About Rocky Mountain Power
Rocky Mountain Power provides safe and reliable electric service to more than a million customers in Utah, Wyoming and Idaho. The company works to meet customers’ growing electricity needs while protecting and enhancing the environment. Rocky Mountain Power is part of PacifiCorp, one of the lowest-cost electricity providers in the United States. More information available at rockymountainpower.net.