Why You Need Sygma Solutions CAT And Genny Training

If you are involved in construction work of any sort, then using the CAT and Genny to locate underground services is a given. These tools can help to find exactly where services run, what type of service they are, how deep down they are, and more. They most certainly are clever pieces of technology, but you need training in order to ensure that you use them in the right way. In addition, you also need to be aware of the fact that they have some limitations, and you need to know what to do if you run up against a problem. 

For instance, one limitation can be depth. You might use the CAT and Genny together (we always recommend using them in combination) and the result shows that there is nothing at the point at which you need to dig. Before you rush off and start merrily digging with your JCB, safe in that knowledge, it is also possible that you could be wrong.

What Do You Do?

For example, the result may have been because of the depth of the service. Some tools can only read to a certain depth, and so anything below that will not show. What do you do?

It’s actually very simple. You start digging, preferably by hand, and when you have got down about a foot you run another survey. This time you may find that the utility that is there shows up. These are the sorts of situations that we teach you how to handle safely when you use the training courses that we provide at Sygma Solutions. 

You may also be able to dig down if, for instance, you only need to go to a depth of two feet, while another service is at a depth of four. This is rather a question of “horses for courses”, but unless you have the knowledge you can still make mistakes. 

Our team has over 100 years of experience in the manufacture and use of the various tools that are needed to locate underground services. We also provide Mala GPR locators and have several available for hire should you need to use them. 

Our job in the somewhat mystical world of underground services is to ensure that you and your team have the knowledge and expertise that we ourselves possess by the time you have finished your course. Then you can proceed with confidence.

Striking underground services when digging can be fatal

When you are a contractor who is often called upon to undertake any sort of works which involve breaking the ground, you have to be extremely careful to avoid striking any underground services. This might seem an obvious thing to say, but the fact remains that there are somewhere around 60,000 strikes of underground services every year – about 230 every single working day up and down the country.

This is not just in order to avoid damage to the services themselves, although that’s bad enough, it is all the other problems which can arise, not the least of which is an injury to the worker or workers who cut into or damage the service. Serious injury happens frequently, and there are around a dozen fatalities every year just as a result of striking underground services.

Depending whose figures you believe, there are anywhere up to 1.5 MILLION kilometres of underground services in this country, so they can be anywhere. Even if it is not 1.5 million, it is certainly above one million marks. OK, we all expect to find electricity cables, telephone cables, water pipes, sewage trunking, gas pipes, and so on in the local high street. But services can be found anywhere, even in places where you would NOT expect to find them.

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HSG47 Guidance From The HSE

HSG47 is guidance from the Health and Safety Executive on how to avoid the dangers from striking underground services when carrying out any sort of excavation work. It is the latest, and third, edition, and was issued in 2014.

As the HSE says, the guidance applies to anywhere that underground services may be found, such as street works; road works; excavation, digging, and piling; demolition and site remediation; site investigation surveys; and “any other work that involves penetrating the ground at or below surface level.” In other words, everywhere. They could have just used the last one and that would have covered it!

The sad fact is that there are some 60,000 strikes of underground services in the UK every year, many causing serious injury, and some of which are fatal. This is despite the fact that responsible contractors do take the trouble to carry out a site survey before they begin digging, using the two main tools, which are the CAT and the Genny.

The problem appears to be that many contractors do not understand the limitations of these two tools, and their surveyors have not been trained in their correct use on a fully-fledged HSG47 training course. If that were not the case, how would there be about 230 utility strikes every working day of the year? It simply wouldn’t happen.

This is why, if you are a contractor involved in any sort of work which involves ground penetration, you should ensure that your surveyors attend an HSG47 course which will teach everything that there is to know about the CAT and Genny, including – most importantly – their limitations. They do have certain limitations: for example, the depth to which they can read. This is just one reason why you should only dig down a foot in an area believed free of utilities because it may be the case that they are actually there, but that the CAT and Genny couldn’t locate them. So you need to check again before digging further.

Reasons Why You Need A CAT and Genny Course before Undertaking Buried Utility Surveys

If you need to locate underground utilities, there is a wide choice of tools available. The cable avoidance tool, known as the CAT, should be used in conjunction with a signal generator (Genny), because a CAT on its' own in Power mode can only detect power cables which are live with power running through them. In most cases, it cannot even detect the same cables when there is no power running through them.

This is just one reason why you need to take a CAT and Genny course in order to fully understand how the two work together. Several companies run a CAT course and will be able to train you in the best practices. There are different tools which can perform a variety of functions, bearing in mind that there are all sorts of buried services such as water, gas, electricity, sewers, fibre optic, and so on. There are some 60,000 cable strikes every year in the UK, which is a lot, and some of them cause serious injury and even fatalities.

Furthermore, a CAT and Genny may detect a cable but not show whether it is a single utility or several buried side by side, or one on top of another.

This is why there is no alternative to attending a recognised course to understand exactly how these tools work, and also what their limitations are. It is like learning to drive a car: you need to understand the Highway Code and you also need practical experience. A CAT and Genny course should cover everything you need to know.  

CAT 4 And Genny 4 Training From Sygma Solutions

When you are a contractor engaged in any sort of excavation – which most contractors are, unless you are just a painter and decorator – the most important thing that you can do is to avoid hitting any underground utilities when you dig. If you don’t know exactly what is under the ground, at best you might hit a water pipe which will make you wet. At worst you will hit an electricity cable which can easily kill, or a gas pipe which can cause a huge explosion and do the same.

Any sort of cable strike is bad because, again at best, you will have to stop work and stand idle until the utility concerned has repaired it. This could cause you loss of income as you have workers doing nothing, but it could also result in a very large claim for loss of income from businesses affected by the damage caused by your workers. It could also result in claims from the company employing you, and loss of reputation in addition. It has not been unknown for a contractor to go out of business as the result of a cable strike.

This is why the CAT and Genny course that we provide at Sygma Solutions is essential training for your operatives. The CAT and Genny are the two most important tools for underground utility location, but the sad fact is that the majority of operatives do not understand how to use them to their fullest capabilities, nor yet understand their limitations.

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Locating Underground Utilities Before Undertaking Groundwork Is Critical

If you are the director of a contracting company that is engaged in any sort of ground work you will no doubt be very aware of the necessity for locating underground pipes and cables before undertaking any actual digging. Even so, you may not be aware of the appalling number of cable strikes that occur in Britain every year. Estimates vary, but an often quoted figure is around 60,000. Several of these result in serious injury and death.

Of course, the cost of repairs is one thing, but the University of Birmingham produced a report in January 2016 (http://assessingtheunderworld.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/IBuild-Cost-of-Strikes-Report-General-Anonymised-FINAL-1.pdf) which indicated that there is a ratio of 29 – 1. In other words, if you have a cable strike which costs £1,000 to repair, the true cost in terms of indirect and social costs such as downtime on site, loss of business by companies affected, and a whole lot more, is £29,000. 

It follows that locating and identifying underground utilities through the use of a CAT and Genny is critical in reducing the number of these incidents. The combined network of underground utilities – gas, water, electricity, telecoms, sewage – totals over 1.5 million km. This is five times the length of the UK road network. Furthermore, the utility industry undertakes about the same number – 1.5 million – of street works every year in order to maintain and upgrade the various systems. 

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The Reasons For The Serious Number Of Cable Strikes Every Year

It is estimated that no less than 1.5 million holes are dug in the ground every year in the UK by utility companies alone, let alone all of the other excavation carried out around the country in the course of construction works. It follows that it is inevitable that underground cables and pipes will be hit during the course of these works.

According to a study carried out in 2006 the reasons for utility strikes are due to one or a combination of factors including poor planning, lack of accurate information, lack of care around services, poor excavation techniques, limited understanding of cable avoidance tools and techniques, and rushing to finish a job.

According to the Health and Safety Executive in 2014, there are some 12 deaths and 600 serious injuries every year just from contact with electricity cables, let alone other utilities. It is also thought that operatives may take less care around some services – particularly telecoms – because they are perceived to be less hazardous than strikes on electricity cables or gas pipelines.

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