Whenever you are engaged in any form of excavation work on Lanzarote, the most important thing is to avoid striking underground cables or pipes. There are two main reasons for this, one of which is that it can cost thousands upon thousands of euros in order to repair the damage. This is why cable detection in Lanzarote is essential in order to locate, and thus avoid hitting anything.

At Canary Detect we can undertake cable detection in Lanzarote for you by using specialist equipment for the location and identification of underground services. The fact is that these can be virtually anywhere. All right, we all know that in a shopping street where there are shops and offices, and on a residential street, there are always going to be electricity cables, water pipes, sewer pipes, telecoms, and more, but they can also be out in a field where you wouldn’t expect them to be.

For this reason, it is essential to undertake cable and pipe detection before ever beginning to put a shovel into the soil. It is not just the cost of damage that is important, but even more so, the risk of injury to workers. If a worker strikes an underground electricity cable it can result in severe burns which on occasion can be fatal. Even striking an underground water pipe can result in severe injury if the water is under pressure. Additionally, it may project stones or other objects with it that are in the ground.

Striking an underground sewer pipe can also be dangerous by way of workers becoming contaminated with raw sewage and suffering infection. Striking telecoms cables may not cause injury but can cause a lot of issues for people relying on telephones and broadband.

There may also be penalties on a contract if it overruns as a result of striking underground services. In addition, businesses that have been affected by an outage may claim for compensation. In fact, it has been calculated that the overall cost of damage to an underground service is 29 times the actual cost of any repairs. So, for, say, six thousand euros of direct damage the overall cost is 174,000 euros.

We Use Specialist Equipment For Locating Underground Services.

Our experts use specialist equipment to locate and identify underground services and then mark them out on the surface so that you know exactly where they are and can therefore avoid them. In many instances we can also show you the depth, which can be extremely useful. For instance, if a pipe is located 1.5 metres below the surface and you only need to dig down one metre, you will know that you won’t hit the service. Certainly, you need to dig carefully, but you can be confident that you are not going to hit it.

Equally, if you need to dig down two metres and a service is located at a depth of just one metre, you will know that it is there. You then have the choice of moving your dig away from the service by one or two metres, or alternatively digging down extremely cautiously with a hand shovel until you locate the service and then very carefully removing soil around it and underneath it. You will also have to provide some sort of support for it in that instance. But at least you know exactly where you stand.

At Canary Detect we use the Vivax Vloc Pro3 EML Locator and the Mala HDR Pro Easy Locator which uses Ground Penetrating Radar to locate underground services.

The Mala Easy Locator was the first GPR system designed purposely for the location of buried services and is able to obtain information about both metallic and non-metallic services such as water pipes and gas pipes. When you are going to carry out any excavation work it is essential to have reliable information about the depth and the location of any services in the area.

Using the Mala Easy Locator and the Vivax Vloc Pro3 together allows us to get as near an exact picture as possible of the services that are in the area you need to dig, and also to show that there are no services in the area if that is the case. Even so, there are certain limitations with some types of ground, so when digging, one should always proceed with the utmost care.