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15-ft-deep excavated sewer trench in Baltimore 2

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bimr

bimr

Civil/Environmental
Feb 25, 2003
9,313
Don't understand why this keeps occurring.

Baltimore Fire Department spokeswoman Blair Skinner tells news outlets that the 19-year-old man was a contract employee working on a sewer line at Clifton Park on Tuesday. She said he was inside a 15-foot-deep (4-meter-deep) trench that wasn’t properly shored up, and a pile of dirt and debris caved in on top of him.

Trench Collapse

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People cut corners and get away with it. Sometimes don't.
 
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There are plenty of laws and regulations to prevent this. But unfortunately, there are no prohibitions against stupidity.
 
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More info here:

I bet there are some wealthy people at R.F. Warder who benefit from this sort of stupidity (up until the point someone dies... but that is what insurance is for).

As for plenty of laws and regulations to prevent this...
A Prince George’s County utility worker was killed last summer when a seven-foot trench caved in. OSHA fined Sagres Construction Corp. $12,800 for failing to conduct daily inspections of excavations, failing to use protective systems that could resist expected loads, and failing to protect its employees from the hazard of cave-ins. The fine was reduced to $2,200 as part of a formal settlement.
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A $2,200 fine for a death resulting from violating the regulations. I bet if they started burying alive the owners of some of these companies when this happens, à la Hammurabi's Code, we'd see a marked downturn in these events.
 
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They should throw the owner of the company in prison for a while, or all the executives if it's a corporation. That would significantly raise the safety issue within these companies.
 
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Maybe we should wait until we find out how it happened before we start hanging people?

Brad

It's all okay as long as it's okay.
 
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thebard3 said:
Maybe we should wait until we find out how it happened before we start hanging people?
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Did you even read the title of the article linked above? There was zero shoring. That's criminal, no ifs, ands or buts.

Dan - Owner
Footwell%20Animation%20Tiny.gif
 
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He's still just the scapegoat, because it's more than likely that he was under time pressure to get the job done without shoring; management know who's going get thrown under the bus.

TTFN (ta ta for now)
I can do absolutely anything. I'm an expert! faq731-376 forum1529 Entire Forum list
 
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That article about the NYC case is from 2016. There were two other cases pending, against the contracting companies. I wonder how that turned out.
 
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I have a question for geotech engineers here. What would you say about entering a trench with side slopes at 60 degrees to the horizontal in stiff clay with Qu at 4.5 t/sf on the penetrometer? Early on in my career I did some site evaluations using test pits and was nearly buried having mistakenly believed this should be very safe. The way this clay got to that stiff condition was by drying, AND SHRINKING AT THE SAME TIME LEAVING VERTICAL CRACKS. That was a bunch of clay blocks not "glued" together. Could have been fatal.
 
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I have worked in heavy construction and earth work. We always had "Coffin Boxes" laying around the sites, a simple task to grab one with the rubber tired 20 ton Grove Crane and place in a ditch to protect the workers.

A 19 year old does not know much about safety: The Journeymen, Supervisors and Site Manager failed in not keeping abreast of the work going on. A pair of experienced eyes watching all work is required. Especially with young new hires!!!
 
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The trench didn't happen instantaneously, so ALL the experienced people had to know about it, including the guy who dug the trench, which was likely to be a relatively senior guy, given that excavator driving is not given to junior personnel.

TTFN (ta ta for now)
I can do absolutely anything. I'm an expert! faq731-376 forum1529 Entire Forum list
 
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$2200 is probably a lot cheaper than shoring. Score one for the owners.

Bill
--------------------
"Why not the best?"
Jimmy Carter
 
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Maybe, but more likely score one for the lawyers.
 
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