EMR 0.86. Zero OSHA recordables over three years. ISN and Avetta qualified. A written frac-out plan for every crossing. The numbers and the program your procurement team needs to approve us.
Our experience modification rate is 0.86, below the 1.0 baseline most EPCs gate on, and we have zero OSHA recordables over three years. We are prequalified in ISN and Avetta, carry $5M / $2M coverage, and run a written inadvertent-return (frac-out) plan on every crossing. Safety is how we protect your schedule and your COD.
A drill rig under a live road, a rail line, or a wetland is a safety problem before it is a production problem. The companies that prequal us know that, so they gate on the same handful of metrics every time. Here is what each one is, where we land, and how we get there.
The experience modification rate, or EMR, is a number your workers compensation insurer calculates from your actual loss history against the expected losses for a contractor of your size and trade. 1.0 is the industry baseline. A score above 1.0 means you have had more or costlier claims than expected. A score below 1.0 means fewer. Most EPCs, developers, and GCs set a hard prequal threshold at or below 1.0, and many tier their bid lists by it.
We sit at 0.86. That is not a marketing number, it is the number your own prequal system will pull, and it clears the gate on the books before a single conversation about schedule begins. Our experience mod letter and current loss runs are available on request.
An OSHA recordable is any work-related injury or illness beyond basic first aid, the kind of event that lands on your OSHA 300 log and drives your incident rates. We have logged zero recordables over the last three years. We still track near misses and first-aid events, because the events that never become recordables are the ones that tell you where the next one would have come from. OSHA 300 logs and our incident-rate history are available on request.
An inadvertent return, or frac-out, is when pressurized drilling fluid finds a path to the surface instead of staying in the bore annulus. On a solar site that can mean bentonite surfacing in a wetland, a stream, or a roadway, and that is a regulatory and schedule event you do not want to manage on the fly. We do not. Every crossing gets a written plan before the bore starts. It is site-specific, it is reviewed with the crew, and it covers the full sequence below.
We read the geotechnical data for the crossing, soil type, depth to rock, groundwater, and the presence of gravels, fractured rock, or other high-permeability ground that raises frac-out risk. The geotech read drives the bore profile, the depth of cover, and the fluid program. If the data is thin, we say so and recommend potholing or additional borings rather than guessing.
We design the drilling-fluid program to the ground, not to a default. That means the right mud weight and viscosity, the right additives for the soil, and a flow and pressure plan that keeps the borehole stable while staying under the pressure that would fracture the formation. The fluid program is the single biggest lever on frac-out risk, and we treat it as an engineered input, not a field improvisation.
We monitor annular and downhole pressure during the bore so the crew sees a developing problem in the data, not on the ground surface. When pressures climb toward the formation limit, the crew adjusts flow, rate, and fluid before a return occurs.
A spotter walks the bore path during drilling, watching for the first signs of a return at the surface. On sensitive crossings, wetlands, streams, and waterway banks, that surface watch is continuous and the walk pattern is defined in the plan.
Containment is staged on site before the bore starts. Spill kits, absorbent, and the materials to build a containment ring at the entry and exit pits and at any anticipated return point are in place and the crew knows where they are. Containment that arrives after the return is not a plan, it is a cleanup.
The plan defines the conditions that stop the bore: a confirmed surface return, pressures past the defined limit, loss of returns at the pit, or any crew member calling it. Anyone on the crew can stop the bore, with no consequence and no second-guessing. A stopped bore is recoverable. An ignored warning is not.
If a return does happen, the plan already says who does what: contain it, clean it, document it, and notify the agencies and the client per the permit conditions. We write the notification chain into the plan so the response is a procedure, not a scramble. That is the difference between an incident that closes in hours and one that idles your site.
Our crews are owner-operated and run our own rigs, so the people drilling your crossing are the people who own the outcome. Operators are trained and competency-checked on the rig and on the fluid program, and crews carry current OSHA 10/30, first aid/CPR, and the task-specific certifications the work requires. Documentation is available on request.
Every site gets a written site-specific safety plan, and every shift starts with a job hazard analysis and a toolbox talk tied to the day's actual tasks and conditions. Generic plans do not survive contact with a real crossing, so ours are built to the site and updated as conditions change.
We maintain active accounts in ISN and Avetta, complete the safety questionnaires, upload our insurance and program documentation, and respond to client-specific requirements so we stay in good standing. If your prequal runs through one of those platforms, connect us and we will be current before mobilization. The full document set lives on our prequalification page.
The program is not a binder on a shelf. These are the practices that run on site, every shift, on every crossing.
Every shift opens with a job hazard analysis and a toolbox talk tied to the day's tasks, ground, and weather. Conditions change, so the plan changes with them.
A site-specific inadvertent-return plan is on site before the bore starts, reviewed with the crew, with containment staged and stop-work triggers defined.
Any crew member can stop the bore at any time with no consequence. A stopped bore is recoverable. A pressure warning that gets pushed past is not.
Annular pressure is watched in the data while a spotter walks the bore path. We see a developing return before it reaches the surface.
The people drilling your crossing own the rigs and the outcome. Competency-checked operators, current OSHA and first-aid certs, and accountability that does not get subcontracted out.
ISN and Avetta accounts maintained, COIs and additional-insured endorsements ready, $5M / $2M coverage scalable on request. Current before mobilization, not after.
A frac-out in a wetland, a recordable on your site, or a prequal gap at mobilization all do the same thing: they stop the bore. And the bore is on the critical path. We treat the safety program as the thing that protects your COD, because an idled crossing holds up everything downstream of it.
That is why the geotech read, the fluid program, the monitoring, and the written contingency are non-negotiable on every crossing, large or small. We would rather over-plan a bore than explain a surface return to a regulator with your schedule on the line.
Our experience modification rate is 0.86, below the 1.0 industry baseline. Most EPC and developer prequal gates require an EMR at or under 1.0, so we clear that threshold on the books. Current loss runs and our experience mod letter are available on request.
Yes. Every HDD crossing gets a written inadvertent-return plan covering the geotech read, the drilling-fluid program, downhole pressure monitoring, surface monitoring, containment and spill kits on site, stop-work triggers, and the cleanup and reporting contingency. It is site-specific and reviewed with the crew before the bore starts.
Yes. We maintain active, current accounts in both ISN and Avetta. We complete the safety questionnaires, upload insurance and program documentation, and respond to client-specific requirements so we stay in good standing before mobilization. Full details are on our prequalification page.
Zero OSHA recordables over the last three years. We track near misses and first-aid events, hold daily JHAs and toolbox talks, and run a stop-work culture where any crew member can pause the bore without consequence. OSHA 300 logs are available on request.
Our crossings are planned and executed to the safety standards, prequalification systems, and damage-prevention practices the underground-construction industry relies on. Useful references:
Run us through ISN, Avetta, or your own system. EMR 0.86, zero recordables, COIs and the frac-out plan ready to go. Let's get the underground scope off your critical path.
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