Heroes in Locating

[Wingfoot]

Wing, Thank goodness your situation resolved the way it did.

Hey Buddy - As much as I would like to lay claim to this USICer's heroic actions, I cut and pasted this off my USIC safety bulletin email to share on this thread. Luv Ya Man..............

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[Fatboy]

Everyday it is our job to protect ourselves, and the general public just doing our jobs. In itself, that can lead us all in types of complacency issues. I have studied accidents and incidents that suround our industry as a whole for many years. I read a report a few years back that said that Monday mornings, Friday afternoons, and almost every day prior to lunch there was a high number of accidents. (Vehicle & Industrial). As well, it noted trends at the end of he day ,when folks had planned to go home, and were forced to work overtime, had similar results. The report went to state that the Monday accidents were in some cases related to the "Sunday" activities that left workers a "little dazed and confused" when they returned to work on Monday. "Friday" afternoon accidents showed that workers were ready to go home and had their minds somewhere else.

Sadly, I have lost two of my best friends because of these "trends". The 1st was involved in a plane crash in Charlotte, N.C. This was Monday morning crash, January 2003, the pilots did not do a through "safety checklist". The plane was overloaded, and the ground crew had warned them that the plane looked "a lttle low". However, the pilots decided that they knew best, 30 seconds after take off, the plane crashed on the airfield. The NTSB did make changes with rule making that requires a better "formula" for insuring that planes were not overloaded going forward. You can read this all on the NTSB website. His widow is very wealthy now, however, if you asked her this was "blood money", and was never enough to heal her scars

The second one was related to the "Greenbriar , West Virginia Observatory". My best friend for 18 years (Union Ironworker on a Federal job) was working a project that was under "resourced" and was behind in schedule. The supervisor did not reinforce "tie offs" (it was a rule, not inforced) while returning down in a open steel framed lift (man basket operated by a crane)When they were coming down from putting the last piece of iron for the day, it was dark, the radios they were using for communications had died an hour prior to the accident. Upon desent, the crane operator "hung the man basket on a wire", it tipped the basket until it broke free. The slack in the cranes line shot the basket out after it had broke free, thowing him 12 floors to the ground. He hit steel beams twice before hitting the cement. He did not have to die. This being a "Federal" project I felt that this would be heavily scruntized by "OSHA". It was investigated, and again the "OSHA" rules were changed , this is under "Falls" if you are a reseacher. His widow, because this was an accident on Federal property, yes, you got it, recieved zero. Damn, I sure miss him!

Bottom line is, safety is something we ill afford to take for granted. Reading the post of Wing's is important to all of us that reads his post.I do not care where he recieved his information, if he cut and pasted this from his companies website, great ! We can all learn something from it, correct?

Last thing from me, it is back to school time here in West Virginia, y'all watch out for the little ones, ya hear? Walk the "circle" around your vehicle before you start it up, if something still does not seem right, give it another look. The life you save may be your own. Safety is everybody's business.

[ifinditunderground]

Terrific post Fatboy, something for all of us to keep in the back (and front) of our minds.

[GPGrasshopper]

Hey Buddy - As much as I would like to lay claim to this USICer's heroic actions, I cut and pasted this off my USIC safety bulletin email to share on this thread. Luv Ya Man..............

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My bad. Guess I should gone back and read the top line again before posting. Either way, good post and a bad accident avoided.

[Wingfoot]

A USIC Hero in Houston!

Mitch Emmons - USIC Locator

Houston, Texas

From: Becca A.
Sent: Monday, October 13, 2008 11:20 PM
To: Scott Woerner
Subject: Your Employee

Dear Mr. Woener,

I got your name from your web site since the company name is different than the name on the side of your employee's truck.

Late at night, on September 13, the day after Ike hit, I was headed to Waco and got a flat tire on Hwy 71 just south of Columbus. I pulled off the road and accidentally got stuck on the side of the road. I tried for some time to wave someone down but no one would stop. After hours of trying to wave someone down, your employee stopped to help me. He was in a white truck with a camper shell. I wrote down the plate number but have since misplaced it, and I can't remember his name. I think he said Michael or Marshall; something like that.

He did not have the tools to change my tire, but did have 2 cans of fix-a-flat which he put in my tire. He followed me 10 miles to make sure I got to the safety of the McDonald's parking lot in Columbus. I lost my purse in Waco, so he went into the closest gas station, bought us some water and some snacks for my 6 year old daughter. He told us to wait there while he went home to get his tools. He returned about 40 minutes later in a small red Ford 2 door car. He gave us sandwiches, a few cans of Dr. Pepper and a stuffed butterfly for my daughter!

He took off the fix-a-flat tire and put on the spare, which we soon learned was also flat. He called a friend, went to his house with both flat tires and returned with both inflated.

Now if the story ended there that would be enough - but it doesn't. He gave me his cell phone number and said that if I needed any more help to call, any time of night. Am I glad he did. I got 15 miles down the road and ran out of gas! I called him, he brought 5 gallons of gas in a can and he followed us back to the same gas station. He put another 10 gallons in the tank, filled the 5 gallon gas can and gave that to us as well.

I have never met anyone like him. He said he was working with the power company fixing poles and was on his way home after working all day. But still he stopped to help us out, at a time we needed help the most. I called him the next day to repay him for all he did, but he refused. I saw a truck just like his today and wrote down the company name. That gave me a company to write to so you could know what a special employee you have. Please thank him again for me. I do not know how that night would have turned out had he not gone out of his way to help out a single mother and child. I will never forget what he did for us, and I hope you realize what an asset he is.

Sincerely,

Rebecca and Kayleigh

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'Friends are God's way of taking care of us.'

This was written by a Metro Denver Hospice Physician:

I was driving home from a meeting this evening about 5 pm and I was stuck in traffic on Colorado Blvd. The car started to choke, sputter and then died - I barely managed to coast into a gas station. I was glad only that I would not be blocking traffic and would have a somewhat warm spot to wait for the tow truck. I couldn't get the motor to turn over. Before I could make the call for a tow service, I saw a woman walking out of the Quickie Mart building. It looked like she slipped on some ice and fell into a gas pump, so I got out to see if she was okay.

When I got to her, it looked like she had been overcome by sobs rather than the fall. She was a young woman who looked haggard with dark circles under her eyes. She dropped something as I helped her up. I picked it up to give it to her; it was a nickel.

At that moment, everything came into focus for me: the crying woman, the ancient Suburban crammed full of stuff, 3 kids in the back (1 was in a car seat) and the gas pump reading $4.95.

I asked her if she was okay and if she needed help. She just kept saying "I don't want my kids to see me crying!" So we stood on the other side of the pump from her car.

She said things were very hard for her right now and was driving to California to her parent's home. So I asked, "And you were praying?" That made her back away from me a little, but I assured her I was not a crazy person. I said, "He heard you; and He sent me."

I took out my credit card, swiped it through the card reader on the pump and instructed her to fill the tank. While it was refueling, I walked to the McDonald's next door. I bought 2 big bags of food, some gift certificates for more, and a big cup of coffee for her. She gave the food to the kids in the car who attacked it like wolves. We stood by the pump eating fries and talking a little about her situation.

She told me her name, and that she lived in Kansas City. Her boyfriend left 2 months ago and she had not been able since to make ends meet. She knew she wouldn't have the money to pay rent on January 1. In desperation, she called her parents, with whom she had not spoken to in almost 5 years. Her parents were happy to hear from her and said she could come to California to stay with them. They loved the idea to be with their grandchildren while giving her time to get back on her feet again.

So she packed the kids and everything she owned in the car. She told the kids they were going to California for Christmas, but had not told the kids they were all going there to live.

I gave her my gloves, a little hug and said a quick prayer with her for safety on the road.

As I was walking over to my car, she said, "So, are you like an angel or something?"

This definitely made me cry. I said, "Sweetie, at this time of year, angels are very busy. Sometimes God uses regular people instead."

It was so incredible to be a part of this lady's miracle. And of no surprise to me, when I got in my car, it started right away and got me home with no problems. I'll put it in the shop tomorrow to check, but I would be amazed if my mechanic found something wrong.

Sometimes the angels fly close enough to you that you can hear the flutter of their wings...

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Psalms 55:22' Leave your troubles with the Lord, and he will defend you; he never lets honest men be defeated.'

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[[HAF]Foxtrot]

OVUS1 you have an agenda with your post. To slam USIC for sending out weekly messages is very disrespectful and further more dangourous. Keeping our employees safe has to be the number 1 objective in any utility locating company the next would have to be keeping those around us safe. If you have any examples of your empolyees going above and beyond then please post them here. As someone who has been in this industry my entire life USIC's decision to publicly acnoladge employees for going above and beyond helps encourage us all to do so. It also helps us look past just putting paint on the ground and on true damage previntion.
You have said allot of things as of late on several posts that makes me think maybe you have things together beter that I had origionaly thought. You say some things that make people that know the industry take notice, but posts like this show that my origional read was correct. Your heart is in the right place but you just don't know what you don't know. I wish you well in your new adventure, mainly for your people. I hope that you can admit you are wrong before your pride hurts those around you. We in the industry know that we have to ballance Personal and work life and in the spring and fall the locating industry in the North half of the country does take more of our lives than we would want but in the summer and winter we do not give as much of our lives(hours worked) to the industry. We must always keep our focus but the amount of hours is not as heavy.
Your employees hours will be increadibly high if you trully do want to be to locates on time and have your employees protect the communities in which they work and how long they have to do this depends on how quickly you will let your pride step aside and hire the correct amount of people to do the work. But you do not know what you do not know and I do commend you for trying.
I have watched this website for over a year and never once contributed with a post. I signed a name up in the last week because I saw some posts that I thought I should respond to but decided against it. Your neive statements, and you anouncing yourself as the owner of OVUS, your posts command a little more respect, as with anything else in managment with more respect comes greater responsability. You slamming a competitor for doing the right thing is not using the responsability that is expected of someone in your position. That is why I have sent my first post.

Spelling Fail, Paragraph Spacing Fail, and Grammar Fail.

OVIS doesn't have no agenda, he was stating exactly what I felt. Its great USIC has locators like this, but every company does. He wasn't taking pop shots at you. The way you handled yourself in this message doesn't convey your argument good. So in effect, you are saying that if I said, "Well USIC ain't the only company that did this, I wish someone would post some safety stories of Consolidated." That there is a agenda behind that?

Thats a bad mind set to be in, especially when this forum is here to share information, not accuse. When you look at it bare bones, we all do the same exact thing as one another, except for the most part, everyones logo is different.

My two cents

[Panther]

I remember when locating was fun. Where did it go?

[TBONE]

CLS gave me one of these early this year pretty nice to get something back like that

[Wingfoot]

Andy Karsten

Eastern Missouri

On Friday, February 26, 2010, Andy Karsten was driving home from work traveling north on Highway 79 when he witnessed a head-on collision. Andy watched as one of the cars flew off the highway airborne. Andy immediately pulled off of the highway to offer assistance to the passengers in the car. The car that flew off the road ignited into flames.

Andy found that there were 3 passengers in the car. He immediately pulled one of the passengers out of the back seat of the vehicle. The young man was in shock and had two broken wrists and a large hole poked into his side. Andy moved him a safe distance from the burning vehicle and immediately returned to find the front seat passenger climbing through the passenger-side window. Andy assisted this person away from the car. Andy returned to find the driver still behind the steering wheel unconscious.

He tried to open the driver’s door but it was jammed shut. Andy was not able to open the door without a tool. Andy ran back to his truck to grab something to pry open the door. When Andy returned to the car, the driver was crawling out of the passenger-side broken window. Andy assisted the driver away from the burning car as well.

Thanks to Andy’s fast thinking and quick actions there were no fatalities in this accident and the car fire was extinguished. The driver and the front seat passenger suffered only broken bones. The back seat passenger, that Andy pulled out first, had broken bones and internal injuries.

Considering his actions, I would like to recommend that Andy Karsten receive the "Count On Me Award" due to quick thinking and fast actions to help the victims of this serious car accident.

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[benlinus]

"Spelling Fail, Paragraph Spacing Fail, and Grammar Fail.

OVIS doesn't have no agenda, he was stating exactly what I felt. Its great USIC has locators like this, but every company does. He wasn't taking pop shots at you. The way you handled yourself in this message doesn't convey your argument good. So in effect, you are saying that if I said, "Well USIC ain't the only company that did this, I wish someone would post some safety stories of Consolidated." That there is a agenda behind that?

Thats a bad mind set to be in, especially when this forum is here to share information, not accuse. When you look at it bare bones, we all do the same exact thing as one another, except for the most part, everyones logo is different.

My two cents"


Oh the irony...

[Wingfoot]

Gary Brechbill

Kansas

An E-mail message from Gary to his teammates:

Guys -

I want to share something that I was involved in on the way home. This one really hit home with me.... 5 minutes sooner and it could have been me......

I was on my way home at 169 hwy and Englewood Road in North Kansas City, Missouri. Traffic was coming to a stop. Ahead I could see smoke and debris all over the highway. I knew it was a wreck.

I was 10 cars back from the scene. I knew this was bad as I could see several vehicles involved. I thought to myself, I know I am the only one who probably has a first aid kit. I hopped out of my truck with my first aid kit in hand and went to the scene.

All I can say is WOW! What did I just get involved in?

I saw stuff scattered everywhere, people screaming in pain and people covered in blood. I knew I had to act fast, but how was I to act? I was in shock myself! Nothing prepared me for what I saw and was seeing. This scene was SERIOUS.

There were 7 people who were trying to help and none had a first aid kit in hand. I came to my first injured person who was pretty mangled up. This person appeared to have been ejected from one of the vehicles. I had no idea what to do first. I jumbled through the first aid kit as he was screaming in pain. I found a roll of gauze and handed it to the person who was tending to him. The helper then wrapped it around the young man's head to stop some of the bleeding. I then went about the scene checking for other injured people and offering my support, which was my first aid kit.....

There were several cars all along the road that really did not look like cars any more; debris everywhere for about 200 yards and people screaming in pain. This was an eerie scene. 1 person died and several others were not going to make it home safely to the ones they love this day.

In the aftermath, there was 1 dead, 4 people seriously injured, 4 with minor injuries with 7 cars involved.

Guys, I know we hear about safety every day. But please take the time to review our safety topics and put them into action.

Gary

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UPDATE:

A 51 year old woman driving the red Saturn that you see to the right died in this accident. The Kansas City Police Dept is saying that they got some 911 calls about a red Toyota pickup driving erratically and speeding down Highway 169. He clipped a tow truck in the rear, lost control of his vehicle, crossed the median and hit the Saturn head-on.