This is an edited video of excavation we did around a very congested monopole here in Houston last Saturday. The entire excavation was a 2′ wide x 6′ deep around the six foot by six foot foundation. As you will notice we also cleaned out from under the foundation to where the original drill shaft was dug. The entire excavation took one full day.
In February of ’09 we got a call from a new client. Aero Solutions was doing structural up-grades to a mobile phone tower in Corpus Christi. They had to increase the foundation size of the tower in order to accommodate the additional steel they needed to add to the structure. They asked T-Rex to come out and do the excavation at the site to insure that no fiber optic lines got cut while digging in or around the existing foundation. Todd Bothwell of Aero Solutions finds vacuum excavation cost comparable to hand digging or getting an excavator on site. Furthermore, Todd stresses Aero Solutions never waivers on safety.
Todd hired us to safely and non-destructively use vacuum excavation (or hydro excavation) to remove the soil for the expansion of the foundation. Vacuum excavation is a process by which air or water is used to dig up the soil and a high air flow vacuum sucks up the debris. Vacuum excavation is completely safe and does not damage fiber optics, electrical, or other utilities known or unknown. In the wrong application, mechanical digging by backhoe or even a shovel can do serious damage to buried utilities.
Initially, it was a small job and I didn’t think much about it. About six weeks later Aero Solutions called again with another site in Louisiana to do the same type of job. This time I took notice and within the next few days I read a story by Dwight Silverman in the Houston Chronicle about AT&T wireless phone coverage getting knocked out twice in one day at the same jobsite due to what sounds like mechanical excavation.
After reading Dwight’s article I connected the dots and sounded the alarm… I had to know more! Wireless data communication has become an integral part of our daily lives. I mentioned to my wife that when our children are old enough to get a mobile phone, chances are they will maintain that phone number for their entire lives. People will allow their water to be turned off before they shut down their cell phones. Why will they do this? Communication is king in business, our sense of personal safety (cellular PCS sites have been integrated in 911 services and national security), and now entertainment (ask your kids if they have a Facebook or Twitter application on their phones). It’s all wireless and it has become as common as water within our culture. WIRELESS IS A UTILITY.
A little research taught me that the premier wireless industry organization is the National Association of Tower Erectors and it turned out they were having their annual conference in Nashville in just a few weeks. With the help of Carol Coughlin (head of membership for NATE) and input from Jim Tracey of Legacy Communications I decided to see if our two industries could help each other out.
That leads me here… typing from my room in the beautiful Gaylord Opryland Hotel in Nashville, Tennessee. In the last three days I have learned a great deal about the wireless tower business. This is fantastic niche industry full of die hard tough guys who assemble and re-modify towers seemingly overnight in utterly adverse conditions thousands of feet off the ground. I sat through the best safety presentation of my life by Craig Synder and Todd Thorin of Sioux Falls Tower and Communications and learned about how they created a culture of safety and what it took to get them to that point. I have learned about the future of tower erection as it applies to the rural wireless expansion in the 2009 stimulus bill and of the detriment the delay of HD broadcast caused to the industry. I also learned about the dangers of guy anchor and rod corrosion from David Davies of Electronics Research, Inc. and discussed possibilities about how vacuum excavation may be able to simplify the inspection process of guy anchors.
In short… it has been fascinating and I am hopeful that T-Rex will grow with this amazing industry. I am grateful to all of those I met on this trip and what they taught me.
What I leave this conference with are 3 intentions:
Thank you again to everyone who gave me their time and interest. I will be posting results here, please check back soon.
Why would I shave off my beard of 5 years just to turn around and grow it back again? Well, for only one reason…charity!
As silly as it may seem, this is easily one of the more difficult things I have done in the recent history of my life. You see, after an arduously slow balding process, in moment of disgust I shaved my head. I quickly adjusted to being bald and loved the laziness of not having to comb my hair. At that point I had a goatee and became even lazier and decided not to shave the remainder of my face. The beard grew in and I loved it. JJ approved, to the point of telling me not to bother coming home without a beard again!
Thus my beard became, essentially… permanent, until last Friday. I heard about this “Mustaches for Kids” last year and missed the “pageant.” This year JJ reminded me before I “missed” my opportunity.
So, in short, I have shaved my bearded face to the highest smoothitude. I now beseech you to sponsor my “re-bearding” for this hilarious way of fund raising. Please read below for particulars and know that my personal payment is only to have the shock of those who have never known me any other way than bearded. This particularly includes my co-workers at www.tex-rex.com who 
undoubtedly will humiliate me at every moment possible. I will miss JJ over the next number of weeks as she will be sharing her bed with what appears to be a younger (smoother) version of myself.
I will return, beard in tact… please help me in this wonderful and fun way of giving back to a world that has been extremely generous. God bless!
Karl
Mustaches for Kids is a volunteer-run organization started in Los Angeles in 1999 to do good and have fun by growing Mustaches for children’s charities. Since its humble beginnings, Mustaches for Kids satellite chapters have spread across the continent, a steady expansion that is not unlike the measured, deliberate growth of a Mustache. Through the years, Mustaches for Kids has enlisted the efforts of hundreds of brave of Growers who, collectively, have raised over $150,000 for charities such as the Make-A-Wish Foundation, Children’s Hospital of New Orleans, and San Francisco’s Legal Services for Children.
Here’s how it works: Each year, during the four-week Growing Season between Thanksgiving and Christmas, Growers sprout sweet, sweet Mustaches. Per Mustaches for Kids bylaws, they shave their faces, except for the Mustache, a minimum of one time per week and solicit donations from friends, family, co-workers, and people in the community. Kind of like getting pledges to run a marathon. Without the exertion, cramping, or dehydration. Call it a facial hair marathon. At the end of the Growing Season, each Mustaches for Kids chapter hosts a Mustache Competition, which is a cross between a beauty pageant, dog show, and police line up. During the Competition, Growers, often in Mustache-enhancing costumes, are put through a test of mind, body, and Mustache and allow their facial hair to be evaluated by an independent panel of judges, and one Mustache is declared to be the “Sweetest.”
So it’s all pretty simple: mustache, charity, competition infused with meaningless pageantry. You can spare four weeks of your life for that.
In the words of our founders, “grow with us.”
Teachers Ask. You Choose. Students Learn. What if there were a simple way to provide students with the books, technology, and supplies that they need to learn?What if people from all walks of life could connect directly with public schools, learn about specific classroom needs, and choose how to help?
DonorsChoose.org makes this possible.
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