Thanks to the National Drilling Association (NDA) for promoting drilling safety through the adventures of Chuck Rench and Kelly Barr.

We scoured our inbox to come up with some of the feedback we have received over the last few years on the performance of our drilling crews.  Not every job goes as smoothly as planned but we aim to do everything we can to achieve your goals.  Please do not hesitate to provide us with any feedback – both positive and negative.  If we get positive feedback, we’ll pat our own backs; if we get negative feedback, we will try to implement improvement.

“The boys were valiant.”

“Job went well. The crew was great, so give them a thanks for me.”

“Things went well enough in St. Catharines, appreciate your expertise.”

“……just dropping a quick line to say that Greg and Dave did a sweet job on the little site I had in Guelph……..Difficult drilling (although shallow) due to cobbles and close bedrock outcrops, but we still got some good samples and the boys were off my site within an hour fo my drilling budget. The well completions were also very good. ”

“Much appreciated as always.”

“Your guys were excellent.”

“Be assured that when I have opportunity to recommend your services for drilling in your niche market I will. ”

“I have always been satisfied with the performance of your equipment and staff.”

“Dave is the best !”

“Everything went well and completed on time.  I will give you a call if we have any drilling job coming up in near future.”

“Space was tight but the job went well.”

“Everything went very smoothly.”

“I just wanted to drop you a quick note to let you know how impressed I was with Kodiak on the last 2 jobs you’ve done for me.  Your guys were very helpful and professional, and your equipment was excellent.  I look forward to working with you in the future!”

“….just want to say thank you very much for a job well done with respect to the well decomissioning earlier this week.  We were both pleasantly surprised with the increased effectiveness as the day progressed, and that the job was completed in one day.  You both were great to work with, and when/if we ever are in charge of well decomissioning again, we’ll be in touch.”

“I have recommended you to our other office as I was always very happy with the work from your crew.”

“Everything went well. I was very impressed with the drill and your crew.”

“I have been meaning to give you a call. The drilling went well and your men did an excellent job. I will definitely be giving you a call on future projects.”

“The work went really well …….the guys were great.”

“Thanks for the good service. Your men were cheerful and professional despite the driving rains.  …..Looking forward to another opportunity to work with you.”

“…..not only did your team do a good job, they did it under the influence of a challenging client.”

“It was a pleasure and I look forward to working with you in the future.”

“Thanks for the great service.”

“I too enjoy our work relationship, you have been quite fair with me over the years.”

“Thanks Randy, I owe you one.”

“By all accounts, your work was great (thanks).”

“Just wanted to let you know I was very impressed with the production of the mini-mole and your crew yesterday. ”

“The work went very well”

“Thanks for sending a couple good competent men to complete the work ….everything went well, no complaints.”

“Thanks for the work on the 400, your rigs worked well for us.”

“Good team – as usual.”

We have received some very positive feedback on our recent newsletter.  The July issue was devoted to utility locate issues and generated some positive feedback.  We have enclosed below, excerpts from some of the emails we received.

Thanks for including me on your mailing list. Your newsletter is very informative. It contains some very interesting articles as well as useful information.

….you’ve done a great job on preparing this newsletter. I believe all consultants and their clients should read this through carefully. Informative and helpful.

Thanks for this newsletter. Good reminder on the importance of locates. Cannot be emphasized enough.

….Good article! Informative! If this is the norm, then we should all comply.

Thanks for this newsletter. Good reminder on the importance of locates. Cannot be emphasized enough.

I did receive your newsletter. Very impressive.

One of the problems we often encounter, is misunderstandings related to having ON1Call locates completed for indoor drilling projects.  We are facing challenges with locate requirements due to the approach of ON1Call to locate requests that involve drilling inside buildings.  The feedback we are getting is that ON1Call is refusing to provide the requisite locates when a request is made that indicates that drilling will be undertaken indoors.  We can partly understand the response, as ON1Call needs to make it known to callers that they do not locate privately owned services, which are the predominant utilities normally found indoors.  However, we don’t believe that this is fulfilling the regulatory requirements of ON1Call utility members to mark the locations of their infrastructure.  Although we are aware that it is rare for member utilities  to have infrastructure under buildings, it does occur in some locations.  We are not aware of any exemptions within the applicable Acts (and associated Regulations) which specifically exempts one from obtaining locates when the drilling is being undertaken within a building.  Discussions with TSSA personnel have suggested that TSSA also interprets the regulations this way.

The problems noted above are leading to very frustrating and costly experiences for Kodiak, our consultant customers, and their property owner clients.  We are arriving at sites, prepared to drill, but having to refuse to do the work because the locates are incomplete (i.e., they do not have ON1Call locates).  When we are told that ON1Call refuses to do the locates, we are all in a state of paralysis, as we can’t drill without proper locates and consultants can’t obtain them from ON1Call.  We are aware that some customers, who are familiar with the issue,  are getting around this problem by requesting ON1Call to locate the entire site.

Because of the above noted problems, Kodiak has brought the issue to the attention of Ontario ON1Call.  Kodiak concerns were then presented to the Board of Directors of ON1Call, which includes representation from TSSA regulated utility companies.  Based on our submission, ON1Call has completed a re-education project of their staff to advise staff that they DO ACCEPT locates for areas on the inside of buildings.  Therefore, when calling in for locates, consultants should be able to indicate that their boreholes are inside and still obtain proper locates for their project.  ON1Call has asked that if there are any problems with these requests, people should call the Help Desk at 1-866-466-7613 or email solutions@accu-link.ca.  We commend ON1Call staff for moving quickly to address this issue and hope that the implementation is as smooth as possible.

From Bristol Tennessee, we get this news report – Fencing Company admits to Failure to Call Before Digging.

Most of the downtown was shut down after a gas leak. A fencing company official said his company was supposed to call the one-call center for a locate request prior to digging fence post behind a local shop. Instead, a company employee called 30 minutes after one of their augers ruptured the gas line. The company spokesman said there should have been checks and balances in place, but there were not. The fencing company was completing the last steps of a renovation at the shop that began last year. To get it done quickly, the auger crew began drilling even though the ground had not been marked. Gas line owner Atmos Energy spent nearly three hours patching the leak. About 10 downtown businesses were evacuated and streets were closed and traffic re-routed. In Tennessee, failure to call before digging is a Class B misdemeanor punishable by up to 48 hours in jail, a $2,500 fine or both. Atmos Energy would estimate the cost for the amount of gas lost and for the repairs.

Read the news report by clicking news report

We have some locate contacts on our website as well, that you can get to by clicking locate contacts.

We also have a printable pdf version that you can get by clicking on printable version.  As it is a few years old, it still shows our old logo, prior to rebranding to Kodiak Drilling.

Frontier Utility Locating Services has a good system on their website for finding the phone numbers for locate contacts.  You can select the municipality and see the phone numbers for contacts.  You can get directly to that system by clicking Frontier.

The legal saga surrounding the Bloor Street explosion continues, as a retrial was granted on April 14, 2010.  Anyone who has any involvement with borehole drilling and utility locates is encouraged to familiarize themselves with the Bloor Street explosion.  We have previously posted a number of articles related to the explosion in the “Resources” section of the website.

Based on media reports, it appears that the Ontario Superior Court of Justice has overturned the directed verdict and is ordering a new trial for Enbridge and their locate subcontractor.  The company doing the excavation work without complete locates (Warren Bitulithic Limited) plead guilty in 2006 and was fined over $275,000.

In addition to the news items in our Resources section, some of the stories about the explosion and media reports on the appeal can be found below:

A good description of the incident and the recent appeal ruling, can be found in the April 21 summary provided by John Goudy:
http://landownerlaw.blogspot.com/2010/04/enbridge-bloor-street-gas-explosion.html

For some photos of the site
http://www.dvdbeaver.com/gary/blastweb/blast.html

Toronto Star story on re-trial being ordered (April 16, 2010)
http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/article/796843–enbridge-subcontractor-face-re-trial-in-fatal-blast

Etobicoke Guardian stories on redevelopment, the appeal, and the names of the victims
http://www.mosun.com/news/MA-19032008.pdf

Story on the redevelopment of the site and the memorial garden honouring the 7 people who lost their lives because the locates weren’t complete.
http://www.insidetoronto.com/news/centre/article/55689

Whenever someone wants us to drill without complete locates, we would like them to read the press stories related to the incident, and to think about the seven people killed in the explosion, knowing that the reason for the explosion was that the locates were not complete.

Ontario 1-Call has issued a memo (May 21, 2010), regarding requests for locates being submitted by third parties, which can be read by clicking  here.  It would appear from this memo, that one can no longer request a third party to look after the locates on their behalf.  We have heard through the grapevine that some private locators have been providing this as a service to their consultant clients.  This would also imply that one cannot use locates obtained by others on a site, such as a contractor who may also be working on the site at the same time who provides a copy of their locates to the consultant.  Therefore, when Kodiak is drilling at a site, the locates must be in the name of the consultant who has hired us to drill, unless the other party will be “responsible” for directing the drilling.

It is absolutely imperative that at every site we drill there is a proper locate from the local hydro provider.  Unfortunately we have had a number of sites where we could not drill because there was no hydro locate available from the consultant.  In some areas these are obtained through Ontario One-Call, and in some areas the hydro provider must be contacted directly.  A sad story from the Philadelphia Inquirer tells us all why.

A plumber excavating a trench in West Philadelphia was electrocuted yesterday after striking a 13,000-volt underground power line, causing a short circuit that shut off service to 1,300 customers for several hours, said Michael Wood, a spokesman for Peco Energy Co.  Wood said the contractor had failed to notify utility companies before digging in the 800 block of North Brooklyn Street, near Lancaster Avenue. About 3:25 p.m., the plumber’s equipment came into contact with the high-power line, killing the plumber instantly and shutting down power to a large area. His name was not released.

Electrical service was restored after two hours, but it took two more hours more to make sure the excavation was safe to enter to remove the body, Wood said.

Under state law, anyone planning to excavate is required to call Pennsylvania One Call System at 1-800-242-1776 three days in advance so that utilities can mark the location of underground lines. “It is essential for the safety of workers and the public to call before you dig,” said Wood.

If we drill without a proper local hydro provider locate, we could be substituting the words “a driller drilling a borehole in ………”

Kodiak Drilling is routinely involved in drilling projects to solve non-routine drilling problems.  As the company specializes in limited access areas, solving a problem of how to get the drill to the borehole location and complete the required work program is a daily challenge.

A recent project was presented that involved drilling in an underground parking garage.  The location initially did not present a problem as many projects have been completed in parking garages.  The combination of the additional constraints presented below however, looked like they were going to be impossible to overcome:

• Borehole depth requirement of 40-50ft (~12-15m),

• Overhead clearance of approximately 7ft (2.1m),

• Requirement for Standard Penetration Tests (SPTs),

• Firm silt till materials, overlying unstable flowing sands below the water table, and

• Use of hollow stem augers was not permitted due to the potential for structural disturbance of the sand formation.

Together with the geotechnical engineering consultant and colleagues at Walker Drilling (who worked together with Kodiak on this project), a method was developed to overcome these obstacles.  The primary components of the developed method include the following:

• A Big Beaver drill was used with the tower removed from the drill to allow access to areas with restricted headroom.  Extended hydraulic hoses were used to allow the machine to operate without exhaust fumes within the confines of an indoor environment.

• To overcome the issues of depth and a requirement to limit the disturbance to the sand formation, the drill head was used to rotate BW size drilling casing, with a cutting shoe at the base of the string.  Given the short stroke available, fabrication of custom casing lengths was required before starting the project.

• In order to prevent blow-back of the heaving sands into the casing, the interior of the casing was pressurized (through a swivel), with a dense, viscous drilling mud.

• As a traditional recirculation mud pit could not be accommodated within the low overhead environment, a vacuum extraction system was employed for retrieving the expended mud/cuttings mixture.  A mud pump, operating from an auxiliary hydraulic power unit, provided the mud solution to the casing string, while the vacuum system returned it to a recirculation tank.

• The remaining problem to be overcome was the requirement for SPTs in an area lower than the 8ft minimum requirement for this drill.  This issue was overcome by using a manual slide hammer to advance standard split spoons through the hollow casing.  The  requirement of 300-400 blows per foot in some areas made this aspect particularly challenging for the site crew.

Operation of the casing, the manual hammer, the mud pumping system and the vacuum recirculation component required a large crew, working in off-hours to minimize the impacts to the ongoing garage operations.  By the end of the project, several boreholes along with piezometer installations were completed to a depth of 48ft.

Although the casing/washboring method is commonly used by larger rigs in unlimited access areas, the confines of this site made this seemingly impossible project possible with unique limited access equipment and teamwork.