This 8/11 is a beautiful Sunday and many homeowners will be using the day to tackle some home improvement projects, such as building a deck, installing a new mailbox or installing a fence. In fact, 74% of homeowners have or will dig on their property on their property this summer. Unfortunately, nearly 40% of these won’t call 811 ahead of time to mark buried utilities.[1]

811 Day was created to bring attention to a significant but unfamiliar issue – the high cost and safety impacts of underground utility strikes.

Quantifying the cost and safety impacts of utility strikes is difficult. A compilation of various studies estimates that the direct cost of each strike is $4,000 -- but that doesn’t take into consideration the cost to repair and restore the damage. Taken together, the cost of the strike plus the cost of restoration, the total is 29 times the cost of the direct damage itself.