3 Stooges? 4? 6? 10? ? Even HAD THE COPS CALLED ON ME!

[DEMDeepEllumMusic]

Well the Water Dept did their best to top the 3 Stooges as Plumbers this week!

I've been on site for over a week now at a shoot and of course I have been waiting for the 3 Stooges Moment and THE CITY OF DALLAS CAME TO THE RESCUE AND WINS THE 3 STooges Award-actually all 7 stooges-Larry, Moe, Curly, Shemp, Joe, Big Joe (From the movies) and I think there was one more at the end.

ACt 1!
Last week I heard from the Water Dept Employees mouth to the Contractor that the water service was taken care of-this was before demolition on the north end of the block started=- I was standing right there and got the guys picture.

ACt 2
Demolition Crew is finally down to that end of the block yesterday morning and starts to pull the copper pipes (recycling everything possible from the site) then POP AND WATER GUSHING! The water idiot had turned off the meters and did not pull service which is to disconnect the pipes leading from the building to the meters. BOZO IT IS A DEMOLITION JOB!!! So the water meters get pulled from the mains breaking at least one hole in the main. This was before 10 am-I arrived around 10:30 and took pics of the water flowing-lucky that a storm water drain was right there for the water to flow away in- aprox 4.000 gallons an hour rate THIS IS A BIG MAIN 8+ inches.

ABout every hour or so I would pop another pic off. Calls were made to the water dept at the time of the incident also were made later by a restraunt (11:30 am or so and then again later).


ACt 3
Water Dept Pick Up drives up and a guy never gets out of the truck, I go over and snao a couple shots to get the time line it was 3 pm exactly. HE GIVES ME DIRTY LOOKS AND DRIVES OFF. The Head Contractor drives over to where I walked to towards my car and says where did he go? I also snapped a pic showing the empty street. I said I guess he didn't like his picture being taken. So we talk for a few more seconds and the water guys truck comes back again and he stops at the break which is about 40 ft from the corner. WEll the 2 contractors get out of the truck, wearing company marked shirts, and start walking towards the water guy. (I'm snapping pics as they go to the truck but I don't walk towards the truck just standing at the edge of the perimeter fence) Well the water guy keeps rolling towards the corner real slow so the 2 lead contractors start running towards the truck waving their hands and yelling for him to stop. So the guy throws his truck into reverse and I get his back up lights on.

So they talk to him for a few minutes and he drives off- never gets out of the truck.

ACt 4
Well at about 4 pm a Water Dept Truck with a backhoe and a Dump Truck drive by the site kinda slow-I missed them going by but did see them go by so snapped a pic within a few seconds expecting them to go turn around and come back and get on the job. NO WAY JOSE. They never come back!! All this time even more water is flowing! I leave for the night after 5:00

ACt 5 Now it gets interesting
I arrive at around 11 am and first thing I see is WATER STILL FLOWING AWAY!! I laugh my butt off!

Act 6
Around 3 pm another truck drives up with two guys in it and they stop on the street- I take pics of them. The passenger gets out of the truck and starts walking in the direction of where he would go into the security fence line which has signs every 50 ft or so with phone numbers of the lead contractor. THE SITE HAS HEAVY BULLDOZERS WORKING WITHIN 50 ft of the water break at this time. The water guys get back into the truck and start to back up. A truck with a backhoe drives up and starts to park on the street.
I'm snapping away-standing in a parking lot to wher I can see through a fence gate or I was moving around the perimeter fence or was across the street standing in the doorway of a restraunt (getting elevation). So the pick up just drives onto the site past the fence. THESE 2 stooges get out and pull the meter cover off where the water was flowing-someone had actually put two large chunks of rock to keep the cover from flying off. A third water truck drives through the gate and parks near the break. NOT ONE OF THEM APPROACHED THE DEMOLITION CREW OR CALLED THEIR CELLS. I'm shooting away with a flash - I get no closer than across the street or at the corner from them. The guy keeps giving me dirty looks.

WEll they reach down and try to turn off the water meter! BOZO THE MAIN IS BUSTED!!!
They didn't try this once, not twice not three times but at least 4 times with water now gushing about 20 ft into the air. Now a guy gets out of the third truck gets on his rain gear and he tries the same thing! Not Once Not Twice but at least three times (I was laughing so hard that I lost count). The demolition guys had actually stopped work and lined up at a distance to watch these foools and I though they were going to pee themselves laughing.

Now the water guy who thinks he is the top dog stars yelling at me about why am I taking pictures. I said that I am documenting the demolition and why did they violate OSHA. He goes what do you mean. I said you crossed that fence line without making any contact with the crew working here with heavy equipment. He then grabs his cell (I Know he is calling the cops) SO I walk off staying across the street from them but snapping pics of the 3 guy trying to reach into the hole to turn off the main. (The whole time they are behind a fence. So I went to my Jeep and put my flash cards in my glove compartment and locked them away and left one card in my pocket with the one in camera with about 3 shots on it).

So I walked back when they pulled out a jack hammer and started punching through the sidewalk and when I see that more water was not going to geyser out I decided to walk around the fence. THE WHOLE TIME THE MAIN IS STILL GUSHING. SO I am on the other side of the property and the contractors are all standing around and BSen so I indicated that I wanted to come across the fence line to talk to him and he waved me in. WEll as we are talking about the stooges the cops pull up to the water crew and they start pointing at me. The two hispanic younger officers look towards me and talk to the water guys another 15 seconds or so and get in their car. I verified with the contractor that I asked to be waved in and he said yeah you did that correctly and I asked did anyone from the water dept call your cells and they said NOPE!

So I walk away from the contractors in the direction of leaving the site and the cops pull up across the fence and get out of their car and they go you need to go over there and we need to talk to you. I said I am not going over there but I will go in that direction. I WAS GETTING AWAY FROM THE DEMOLITION TEAM BUT NOT OUT OF THEIR HEARING DISTANCE AND I COULD HEAR THEM KIND OF FOLLOWING ME.

In the meantime all the water crew is walking across the job to the area-not knowing what was safe or not to walk on.

The head moron with the water dept starts screaming gibberish. The cops by this time had walked up to me and said what are you doing and I said that I am shooting the demolition. They said why are you inside the fence and I said that I was waved in by the contractor and then the owner of the demolition company said that He has been taking pictures for us and I have had him come inside the fence earlier to shoot some specific items and he was just waved in right before you arrived and he is fine where he is at. The cops go is he tresspassing because if he is we will arrest him and the demolition guy goes no he is not trespassing and he points out his brother and says that they are the owners of the company and I was waved in.

Now the water moron starts going HE SAID HE WAS WITH OSHA! I said No I did not I said you VIOLATED OSHA LAWS BY DRIVING PAST THAT FENCE LINE WITHOUT CONTACTING THE CONTRACTOR ON SITE. HE GOES WHAT IS NO ONE WAS HERE THAT IS OUR EASEMENT AND WE WOULD JUST CUT THROUGH THAT FENCE! THe moron has no clue! (I was on a federal grand jury for 2 years and we had a lot of OSHA cases before us).

The cop goes we ain't getting into OSHA here.

The moron screams he keeps taking our pictures. Then a fat black guy goes he can't be within 30 ft of my work area. The only sign that they put up was behind the trailer with the backhoe on the street and it was set up in the wrong direction and it was over 50 ft away from where I was.

I pointed out to the officer that I was standing in the doorway of the bar across the street from where they were working.

The water moron kept screaming.

I told the officers that actually that when they got out of the car that I was getting ready to leave from inside the fence anyway because I had already said what I needed to say to the contractor.

So the cops go so your leaving right? (meaning from inside the fence) and I said yes. And they asked the contractor again if I was trespassing and he said NO AGAIN!

So the cops waved off the water crew to get back to work, I walked off the site at the end of the block away from the water crew and the cops got back into their car and left-never asked my name.

I think the demolition guys were about to wet themselves from laughing.

I then pulled out my 80-200 zoom 2.8 and set up across the street and over 100 ft from the water crew, turned off my flash and actually pulled the batteries and started shooting from a restaurant parking lot. One of the owners comes out and start asking what the hell was going on-he had watched the whole thing from his window. He said have fun! I then realize that I was standing on his property and stepped into his business to see if it was ok to take pictures since I was on his property and his brother said you have a job to do go and do it you are fine. So I shot a few there- WATER STILL FLOWING-AT LEAST AN HOUR SINCE THEY PULLED UP.

ACt 6
I then decide to go up the street into a bar directly across from the water guys. I wanted to get a time as to when they pulled the backhoe out to pull up the sidewalk to get to the main to repair it properly. WEll I'm drinking my Guenness and BSen with the bartender going outside every 5 minutes or so and shooting off a couple pics-no flash and then going back into the bar (everytime getting onto public sidewalk). Well after a bit he said I think they left! I go out and all their equipment is gone and they stick up a couple orange cones a a barracade inside the perimiter fence where they had punched through the sidewalk with their jackhammers. The demolition crew had left but had to leave that gate open so they water crew could get their trucks out. So by the time I finish my beer (had gone out to show the crew had left-time stamp on the pics) 5 cars had parked inside the fence!

STUPID FOOLS! I have that documented that they were over 50 ft inside the fence with the cars!

So tommorrow will be FUN!

[bubstang]

I can't wait to hear the rest of this.

[DEMDeepEllumMusic]

I'll be going by the site before going to the Elves shoot downtown and may stop back by afterwards just to see how long it takes them to figure out that the main is busted.

Also I overhead one of the stooges asking another if this was a 4 or 5 inch main, the demolition guy yesterday indicated that it is at least an 8 if not a 10+ inch main!

So the water bozos could not even verify what size mains are running there in the 30+ hours since it was CALLED IN!

[Firegirl]

Trouble-maker!
Does sound like great fun though......

[DEMDeepEllumMusic]

I told the Demolition guys to send a bill to the city for flooding out their work area which is delaying them completing their job. TO THEM TIME IS MONEY! Hey 4 guys using dozers and cranes, 4 guys doing scrap pull work, up to 4 truck drivers bringing in 18 wheelers and this all going on like a ballet and then a section of the job not being able to be finished out because the 3 stooges don't know their butts from their heads and then not killing the main so they spray all the water onto the demolition guys work area?

I've got some shots showing the big dozer coming within 30 ft or so of their little work trucks-that thing could turn those into scrap in about 3 seconds!

[Huck]

Let see some pics! LOL

Sounds like the City of Dallas to me. WTG thats your tax dollars hard at work!

At least DPD didnt give you any trouble.

[JPalmer]

I just wanna see a shot of the water shooting into the air...the rest of the story is freaking hilarious...but nothing makes me laugh like an unintentional gyser.

[Daniel Bates]

Time to pull this guy out again...




C'mon, Paul, you've got to make this an illustrated story!

[DEMDeepEllumMusic]

I'm posting them in my FIRE album at the end-the water guy who just shut the meters off without pulling service is being loaded right now- wearing a blue shirt 8K3Z1120 is the pic # and per exif file he was there right before noon.
I will need to find the pic of the super from yesterday.

[DEMDeepEllumMusic]

Well I'm actually posting the pics in this side album
http://www.pbase.com/demdeepellummusic/inbox
The first pic is the water guy who supposedly disconnected the service-no wrench in hand or back pocket-guess he has a real strong grip.

The rest of the shots so far are all Tuesday Shots when the real stooge activity kicked in. ( I wont be posting any description so that the Contractor won't get in trouble or tick off the city) Now you guys have the story but anybody else seeing the pics will just see pics with no story line.

When I come across the guys who drove up and drove off over the previous 24+hours I wlll slip them in, in the proper order.

But this was hilarious today.

What is truly funny is that during the week I had long discussions with cops on site (they were using several Dallas Cops as security on site or a patrol cop would wave me over and we would end up chatting about the history of lower greenville) or I would have officers who were driving by on Greenville giving me a wave and a smile as I worked all around the site. I guess these guys either had been working the late shift and never saw me on their patrol since I was gone most days by 4, or they were never on Greenville but they never asked me my name or for an ID. I think they figured or knew that my taking pictures of the water workers was totally legal. They were more concerend about me trespassing inside the fence line.

I have to keep on the good side of the contractor because I want to sell him pics of the job so low key on the story line for a while.

ALso I love how the city is screaming about not wasting water but they allowed over 150,000 gallons to go into the storm sewer. (that is more water than I have ever used in a year!)

[Stephen H]

I would assume that the city would turn off water service if necessary, but not disconnect the piping. It should be the demolition crew's responsibility not to damage connecting lines when removing the piping.

I'm not aware of a specific OSHA requirement to contact a work crew when entering onto a worksite, either.

[DEMDeepEllumMusic]

Stephen you are wrong THE ORDER BY THE INSURANCE COMPANY WAS TO PULL SERVICE NOT DISCONNECT- pulling service means disconnecting the pipes from the meter PERIOD- disconnect can mean that the mete is just shut off.

As to OSHA when there are heavy equipment-we are talking bulldozers that can push 30+ ton pieces of stone around- being operated on a site you do have to check with the site Contractor/Foreman before entering PERIOD! This job was contracted also by an INSURANCE COMPANY AND DO YOU THINK THEY WANT PEOPLE CROSSING THAT FENCE LINE WITHOUT CLEARANCE?
http://www.agc.org/page.ww?section=S...isk+Management
1926.859(a)

No workers shall be permitted in any area, which can be adversely affected by demolition operations, when balling or clamming is being performed. Only those workers necessary for the performance of the operations shall be permitted in this area at any other time.

http://www.osha.gov/pls/oshaweb/owad...RDS&p_id=10804

[DEMDeepEllumMusic]

ACT 7
I drive by the site at aprox 10:15 NO BODY AROUND-I can understand the contractor since they were almost finished and one of the guys had no time off since the job start and they were originally planned to be out by Friday and not they will just be out tommorrow instead of today and I think they wanted to give the water people free reign on getting their work done but they forgot that they were dealing with THE 10 STOOGES WATER DEPARTMENT! BECAUSE THEY WERE NOT THERE EITHER! At this time the hole was still full of water and the line was not visible. I documented the site-did overall site shots as I do every day to start to show what the site looked like when I arrived and I took specific shots of the water main break area.

ACT 8
After going downtown to the Elves deal (cancelled due to weather effecting Santas Sleigh and elves in transit from Austin and elsewhere) and then chatting with a local elvi who kind of recognized me-we talked about all sorts of stuff for about 30 minutes and then walking over to the Majestic to take shots of the theatre and some random downtown pics I then go into Deep Ellum to check on the Good Lattimer tunnel situation-looks like they will just doze the rest of it down next year then I grab a slice at Franzinis and then go over to the ART PROSTITUTE and they were open to my amazement so saw the show that was at it currently so I finally go back to the site and guess what- LARRY, CURLY, MOE, JOE, CURLY JOE and SHEMP were NOT THERE! Nothing had been done other than Mother Nature had let the water drain down so that you could see the copper main feed-still think there is more to it than that simple break. So came home after shooting a few pics of the scene again.

Gate still wide open and actully a pickup was parked inside the gate area. CITY OF DALLAS EMPLOYEES DID NOT SECURE THE SITE!

[TXhummer2]

[Tapper]

Having built a couple of long haul fiber optic networks using horizontal boring, I've had my share of issues with water departments. But I can tell you they don't have an easy job, and what you saw was probably only a tiny part of the story.

Bear in mind, main breaks are difficult to fix. Particularly in an old area of town, where the infrastructure has been buried a long time. It's incredibly easy to turn a small problem (an 8in main is a small problem) into a huge problem.

First, shutting off the water is frought with its own problems.

In many cases, the water employees have no idea where the valves and lines are, because when these things were build, there were no GIS or CAD systems. And the hand-drawn plans that do exist (when they can be found) are just crap. So, first you gotta find the valves. Not easy. They may be blocks away, paved over, vandalized, or buried in fire ants.

And you can't just turn off a valve. Especially on old systems. The rapid change in pressure can burst pipes over a wide area. Usually, they have to reduce the pressure slowly over a series of valves, in order to minimize the chances of ancillary breaks. That's after they've found them, and after they've done the math to figure out how to balance the pressure fall. Likely, the trucks you saw were mainly watching the water to be sure it wasn't flooding homes or businesses, and watching to see if the flow was decreasing while someone a half-mile away was working on the valves.

And it's dangerous. I once watched, as a 30 inch main let go while they were turning the valve on it, and blew two workers ass over teakettle, and picked up a single concrete road slab and tossed it 20 feet in the air like so much paper. Think about how much that slab must have weighed. These guys often have to work in deep trenches, or in sewer outlets, where cave-ins kill many hundreds of men a year.

People depend utterly on utilities like water, electricity, gas, etc. Vastly more utility workers are killed in the line of duty every year than policemen. When was the last time you went to a candlelight vigil for Juan, the water worker who died in a cave in trying to restore your water service? These people deserve respect, and get none whatsoever.

And guys like me get really excited when water crews show up with backhoes, and just start digging indiscriminately. Before they can do it, they must do the homework to locate all the other subsurface infrastructure - like fiber lines, gas lines, electric service, telephone service, sewer lines etc etc. That means contacting a bunch of folks. How fast could you do it?

The Dallas water department has to serve how many homes and businesses? You can bet, this was just one of several main breaks they were dealing with at that moment. And since no one likes to pay taxes, it's a safe bet they are forced to use old equipment, short-handed, and make due the best they can. Of course, in the meantime, they face incredible hostility and derision from the very people they are helping, who ought to be applauding loudly that they manage to keep the whole crapulent system working as well as it does - so we can all flush our toilets, take showers, have a drink, wash their car, or whatever.

Lastly, that 8inch main was probably serving a lot more folks than just the area being demolished. Should they have turned off the main during demolition? Since the water pressure is always hot up to the meter, how exactly should they have "removed service" to the meter? Dig it up, and spend thousands of taxpayer dollars prepping it just in case the meter gets snagged by an errant backhoe? Who benefits from this work? Who should pay the costs of uncovering the meter and feeder so the water guys could block it off? The taxpayers?

I can tell you from my own experience - it was the demolisher's responsibility to uncover and expose the meter. I've had to do the same thing to many, and then wait my turn while water crews fought fires and took care of people in line ahead of me. What you saw, was a demolition crew that tried to take a shortcut to save some time, and busted a system they shouldn't have, and then stood around waiting while he water guys were forced to deal with the contractors mistake. No doubt some of the time you observed, was spent determining who was going to pay to uncover and repair that busted main.

Life is like that. Almost nothing is really like what you think you see. There's probably an important lesson there for photographers too. Your eyes, and your cameras, only record the most superficial layer of existance - unless you digg a little deeper.