[presently no screen name]

I always enjoy your posts when your engineer hat is on. I remember what you said about Sandy and how NYC will have problems in the future on how they tackled the problem and it wasn’t good!

Thanks for the pictures, if that pipe was ever on any road I traveled - I never noticed them but now I will and know what they are for.

Does a state have engineers inspecting the crossings and is the only way to do this is rip up the road? Do they have ‘ex rays’ to do this?

[PA Engineer]

Does a state have engineers inspecting the crossings and is the only way to do this is rip up the road? Do they have ‘ex rays’ to do this?

The state and federal have regulations in regards to certain annual inspection requirements. The data is sent in as part of the compliance reports. My experience indicates the data is rarely reviewed beyond a yes or no that inspections were conducted.

There are two methods (short of excavation) for testing. Electrical and pigging are complimentary. The electrical, if properly interpreted would indicate problems with the cased configuration. The pigging would provide information on wall thickness and other anomalies.

I have been contracted in the past by companies to review their compliance work and data. Much of the data is taken by technicians who may understand the testing, or may just be going through the motions of collecting the data. I have found on many occasions that the data was either interpreted wrong for years or incorrectly gathered.