By: Donovan Busta

I found myself in Las Vegas for work on a couple of large projects, when I got a call from my supervisor asking me to swing by a quick job in between work orders. When I arrived, I met with a field superintendent for a large-scale excavation and construction company in Southern Nevada. The site superintendent goes on to explain that the local water company has been to this job site on 2 different occasions; both instances resulted in missed locates. The water lines were more than 50 years old and had no traceable elements to aid in locating the line.

The included images illustrate the accurate locates performed by Blood Hound in less than an hour. In the locate photo (top left), many patches in the asphalt can be seen - these were actually the locations where the water company marked their own water line. The excavation company also spent time and money potholing the site.

The aerial photo sketch is an example of a deliverable provided by Blood Hound. This sketch illustrates where Blood Hound marked the water line, including the meter and the main, identified by the blue lines. The two white lines in the sketch show the marks originally placed by the local water company.

The water line was found almost immediately when using ground penetrating radar technology - the entire job took less than an hour. After the job was complete, the site superintendent was shocked at how quickly and confidently the line was located. In fact, the customer called later to let the team know they potholed to find the line, just where Blood Hound marked. The customer asserted they made the right choice to call Blood Hound, which saved them both time and money.