BOOM! there goes WorldCom

Fri Jul 18 16:49:25 UTC 1997

Eric Wieling wrote:

> Some time ago Scott Yoneyama said:
> >   You're right.  I forgot about the decomissioned pipelines.
> Although,
> > you'd be surprised how stupid some of these morons with backhoes
> are!  I
> > remember a major MCI cut along their west coast route a few years
> ago
> > that took out the entire northwest for 8 hours.  The guy was 600
> yards
> > away from where his permit allowed him to dig.  He stopped when he
> cut
> > the fiber and shut his hoe down.  When they got out there, they
> found
> > that he was digging right next to train tracks, was inches from
> cutting
> > a high voltage power line that surely would have killed him, and was
>
> > also fairly close to a gas line.
>
> Is there any compensation to MCI in a situation like this?  I would
> think that multi million dollar fines would make people think a little
>
> before they start digging.
>
> --Eric

The comment from the VP of Operations who came out to brief us on this
at the time was something to the effect of: "trust me, we'll be putting
this guy out of business and adding a backhoe to our portfolio."

--
Scott Yoneyama
Director
Starcom
(206) 448-4034
(206) 448-4485 fax
yone at wolfenet.com

"The only way between Canada and the U.S. and all points along the way"