CGA – Dirt Report
The Common Ground Alliance (CGA) has released its annual DIRT Report for 2008 (Damage Information Reporting Tool). This report analyses the data provided by US and Canadian information providers on damage to utilities. The report is a very comprehensive analysis of a lot of data.
The report indicates that in 2008 there were a total of over 82,000 “events” in Canada and the US. An “event” is defined as “the occurrence of downtime, damages, and near misses”. Of this total number, 11% (9,348) were related to drilling. For Canada, 405 events were identified as related to drilling. Of the total number of all events in Canada and the US, 59% were attributed to “Notification Not Made” or “Locating Practices Not Sufficient”.
In simple terms, based on this information, it would appear that in Canada in 2008, there were likely over 200 utility incidents involving drilling, related to not calling for locates or not having them done properly.
The Common Ground Alliance is a US based organization that has an Ontario chapter. They have a lot of very useful information related to utility locates and are currently pushing for the establishment of a true One-Call system in Ontario.
The DIRT report can be found by clicking here
The Ontario Regional Common Ground Alliance (ORCGA) can be found at:
www.orcga.com
The Common Ground Alliance (CGA) can be found at:
www.commongroundalliance.com
