Code of Maine Rules › 65 - DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC UTILITIES COMMISSION › 407 - PUBLIC UTILITIES COMMISSION › Chapter 895 - UNDERGROUND FACILITY DAMAGE PREVENTION REQUIREMENTS › Section 407-895-2 - DEFINITIONS

Current through 2024-29, July 17, 2024
As used in this section, unless the context otherwise
				  indicates, the following terms shall have the following meanings.
A.
Business day.
"Business day"
				means a 24-hour day other than Saturday, Sunday or a legal Maine
				holiday.
B.
Borrow
				pit.
"Borrow pit" has the same meaning as provided in
				38 M.R.S.A.
				§482(1-A).
C.
Commercial timber harvesting
				activity
. "Commercial timber harvesting activity" means the cutting or
				removal of timber for the primary purpose of selling or processing forest
				products and includes the attendant operation of mobile or portable chipping
				mills and of cutting and skidding machinery and the creation, use and
				maintenance of skid trails, skid roads, winter haul roads and other roads to
				facilitate timber harvesting.
D.
Commission
. "Commission" means the Maine Public Utilities
				Commission.
E.
Damage
.
				"Damage" means any impact upon, or removal of support from, an underground
				facility as a result of excavation or demolition, which according to the
				operating practices of the operator would necessitate the repair of such
				facility.
E-1.
Damage
				prevention incident
. "Damage prevention incident" means an occurrence in
				which one or more provisions of the Dig Safe law are violated, regardless of
				whether there is damage to underground facilities.
F.
Damage prevention system or
				system
. "Damage prevention system" or "system" means an organization
				whose membership is open to all operators of underground facilities located
				within the State of Maine, which maintains a database, provided by its member
				operators, that includes the geographic areas in which its member operators
				desire transmission of notices of proposed excavation and which has the
				capability to transmit notices of proposed excavation to member operators by
				teletype, facsimile, computer or telephone.
G.
Demolition
. "Demolition"
				means any operation by which a structure or material is wrecked, razed,
				rendered, moved or removed by means of any tools, equipment or discharge of
				explosives which could damage underground facilities.
H.
Dig Safe System, Inc. or Dig
				Safe
. "Dig Safe System, Inc." or "the Dig Safe System" means the damage
				prevention system operating in Maine.
I.
Emergency excavation
.
				"Emergency excavation" means immediate excavation necessary to prevent injury,
				death, or loss of an existing vital service.
J.
Excavation
. "Excavation"
				means any operation in which earth, rock or other material below the ground is
				moved or otherwise displaced, by means of power tools, power equipment or
				explosives and includes grading, trenching, digging, ditching, drilling,
				auguring, tunneling, scraping and cable or pipe driving, except tilling of soil
				and gardening or displacement of earth, rock or other material for agricultural
				purposes.
K.
Excavator
. "Excavator" means any person proposing to make, making
				or contracting for an excavation.
L.
Mechanical means of
				excavation
. "Mechanical means of excavation" means excavation using any
				device or tool powered by an engine except air vacuum methods of
				excavation.
M.
Member
				operator
. "Member operator" means an operator that is a member of Dig
				Safe, Inc.
N.
Notify, notice
				or notification
. "Notice" or "notification" means the delivery of all
				required information to the person to be notified and the receipt of it by such
				person in accordance with this rule. To "notify" means to give notice in
				accordance with the requirements of this rule.
O.
Non-member operator
.
				"Non-member operator" means an operator that is not a member of Dig Safe,
				Inc.
P.
Operator
.
				"Operator" means the owner or operator of an underground facility. Within this
				rule, operators are further categorized as "member operators" and "non-member
				operators."
Q.
Person
.
				"Person" means an individual, partnership, municipality, state, county,
				political subdivision, public utility, joint venture or corporation and
				includes the employer of an individual.
R.
Respondent.
"Respondent"
				means a person alleged to have committed a violation under this rule or
				23 M.R.S.A.
				§3360-A.
S.
Serious damage prevention
				incident
. "Serious damage prevention incident" means a damage prevention
				incident that results in the loss of human life, personal injury requiring
				in-patient hospital admission, evacuation, or potential damages exceeding
				$10,000, or that has the potential to pose a significant hazard to the health
				or welfare of the public.
T.
Shoulder-grading activity
. "Shoulder-grading Activity" means
				highway maintenance work that involves the use of a motorgrader or other
				suitable construction equipment with a blade on the shoulder of a road to
				remove accumulated sand, gravel, sod or other material to establish drainage
				away from the traveled portion of the highway.
U.
Underground facility or
				facility
. "Underground facility" or "facility" means any item of
				personal property buried or placed below ground for use in connection with the
				storage or conveyance of water, sewage, electronic, telephonic or telegraphic
				communications, cable television service, electric energy, oil, gas or other
				substances and including, but not limited to, pipes, sewers, conduits, cables,
				valves, lines, wires, manholes, attachments, appurtenances thereto and those
				parts of poles below ground. This definition shall not include highway drainage
				culverts or underdrains.
V.
Underground facility operator.
"Underground facility operator"
				means the owner or operator of any underground facility, other than an
				underground oil storage facility as defined in
				38 M.R.S.A.
				§562-A(21) or an
				airport aviation fuel hydrant piping system, used in furnishing electric,
				telephone, telegraph, gas, petroleum transportation or cable television
				service. "Underground facility operator" does not include a municipality or a
				public utility with fewer than five full-time employees or fewer than 300
				customers or a person that owns underground facilities on its own property for
				commercial or residential purposes.
W.
Violation.
"Violation" means
				any of the actions identified in
				23 M.R.S.A.
				§3360-A(6-C) (the Dig
				Safe law) as violations subject to the imposition of an administrative penalty
				and acts of non-compliance with the provisions of this rule.