April is National Safe Digging Month
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 and electric, provide the services Americans depend on for their basic everyday needs.
If you are planning a job that requires digging, even if you plan to hire a professional, a call to 811 is required before you begin working. 811 is a free, FCC-designated national one-call number that connects a caller from anywhere in the country to the appropriate local one-call center, which in this area is the District One Call Center.
The District One Call Center will then alert the affected underground facility owners so they can dispatch locators to mark the approximate location of their lines with paint or flags.
Unintentionally striking a line can result in inconvenient outages for entire neighborhoods, harm to yourself or your neighbors, and costly repairs.
Every digging project, no matter how large or small, warrants a call to 811.
Here’s how it works:
- One free, simple phone call to 811 makes it easy for the District One Call Center to notify all appropriate utility companies of your intent to dig.
- Call 2 working days prior to digging to ensure enough time for utility lines to be marked accurately.
- When you call 811, a representative from the District One Call Center will ask for the location and description of your digging project.
- The District One Call Center will notify affected utility companies, which will then send professional locators to the proposed dig site to mark the approximate location of your lines.
- Once lines have been accurately marked, roll up those sleeves and carefully dig around the marked areas.
Keep your project safe for you and your community. Call 811 Before You Dig.