I certainly respect people's private property, just as I'd expect that they would respect mine. But when individuals put these signs up and it's not their property, well I'd like to humor them but I have a job to do and the sign by their driveway stating that 'trespassers will be shot and survivors shot again' doesn't exactly leave me with a warm fuzzy feeling. Was out yesterday doing an as-built on some of our facilities within a State Highway ROW. The adjoining property owner has placed a 'no trespassing' sign on the site. I'm doing my work and he approaches with a hickory axe handle in his hand and shouts at me 'Can't you read? You're trespassing'. After my initial 'fight or flight' reaction and without taking my eyes off that axe handle in his hand I explained as calmly as I could who I was and what I was doing. After 20 minutes of his ranting, he finally decides I'm okay and let's me get back to work. Now I've got to go back and stake that ROW for clearing and this fellow is going to be seriously pissed.
Just because I'm paranoid, doesn't mean they aren't out to get me.
I'm happy to hear you came out of that unscathed. There are some crazy people in this world who act first and think about it next week. Obviously you were able to read the signs correctly. Been there, done that, too many times. Nerve-wracking for sure. Even wilder is when the handy weapon of choice fires bullets.
Glad you're okay. Chris and I had a similar experience a few years ago in Mississippi with a landowner that was clearing trees on my client's land.
I would make sure you had several people with you when you went back to stake the R.O.W., and possibly even a deputy or state trooper.
I've only been physically assaulted once while out surveying. Guy ran out of his house and shoved me down to the ground. Had been working in the rain all day and was dog tired. I looked up at him and told him, 'Just get it over with, I'm too cold and tired to fight back. I'm just a poor schmuck trying to collect a pay check'. Took all the wind right out of his sails. I never pack heat unless I'm in bear country but I do carry 12" gurkha knife in the back of my vest that can come out in .02 seconds. I pray to God I never have to pull that out to defend myself from some nut job. I'd rather run away shrieking like a little school girl. I won't be going back to stake that job alone.
Just because I'm paranoid, doesn't mean they aren't out to get me.
Instances like that led me to get my first cell phone to put 911 and the sheriff's office and my attorney on speed dial.
Hearing your whole story, it would appear the list of people that upset him is just beginning.
Be sure and bring your supervisor or at least personnel or bosses from the State DOT out to the job when you return and mark limits of clearing. Numbers improve your right to work and deflect any aggression away from you and to the ones in charge of your being there.
good luck
Been in only 4 or 5 confrontations with irate armed landowners in my 45 year career. Although surveyors have access rights in the States I work in, the best action is to retreat, contact the local police authority who either calms the owner down or escorts me onto the property so I can do my job. We are not trespassers according to the law, and every time the County Sheriff gets involved they know the Statues so
it's a good outcome.
I love the "private property" signs. I was shooting utilities through an old residential street today. Every house had that same sign. I kept remarking "huh, that's private property"....joke hasn't got old yet. Maybe it'll last at least another week.
Same hear, Trespassing is unlawful entry onto ones property. As a Surveyor we are allowed, under legislation, to enter any properties as long as reasonable attempts are made to contact owners.
In situations like this though (whether it was his property or not) having the law on your side doesn't really matter at the time it happens.
I think that Nebraska only has something like 2% public property, so everything else is considered private property. Why some people think they have to put signs every 200' around the perimeter of their property is strange.
My biggest issues have come from getting permission from either a father or son and then the other shows up demanding we leave because the father/son did not have the right to give us permission. Generally a dispute within the family.
I was held at gunpoint at the famous triangulation station in Kansas for several hours in 1992 after securing permission. Family dispute.
I was hoping to make a religious pilgrimage to Meades Ranch someday before I die, good to know that it MAY be a problem.
Being that I was born in Kansas (Wichita), and the importance of that station in the geodesy world, I have to find some way to get there...............
A fellow was making an Adverse Possession run over a family woodlot. He put up No Trespassing signs with his phone number on them... So I called. He was confused how I got his number and when I told him I was on my family's land looking at his No Trespassing sign he explained he was already in court. I gave him my contact information and told him to get his attorney to contact me.
His case failed. The AP was based on a deed that was fraudulent. If you are going to make up a deed from the 1930's, use a typewriter and find some paper from the decade.
Meade's Ranch
Prior thread on Meade's Ranch.
Ernie Cantu, a Kansas surveyor, has put together some group trips to the site over the years, last in 2009 I think. For some group trips the owners charged a modest fee and provided transportation to the site. The Az mark is not on the same property so was not visited.
It has symbolic significance, but probably not much practical importance - I don't think much would happen if it were accidentally destroyed. After all, it was the linchpin of a now obsolescent datum and everything that is going to be measured off of it for that datum has probably been measured.
It would also be interesting to see the NAVD88 master benchmark up in Canada, but have no idea if that is even possible. The NGS doesn't have a data sheet on it since it belongs to Canada.
http://www.ngs.noaa.gov/cgi-bin/ds_mark.prl?PidBox=TY5255
I was last there in 2011. The landowner was extremely nice. My encounter in 1992 was with an older guy who had a family dispute going on about who inherited the land where the marker was located.
Here is my webpage: http://www.penryfamily.com/surveying/meadesranch.html
Very cool as always, Mr Penry
> Nerve-wracking for sure. Even wilder is when the handy weapon of choice fires bullets.
Yeah.... no freaking s....t!!!!!
I've had guns leveled at me twice while surveying. The guy yelling at me didn't worry me so much as the guy that didn't say much. He just had a bead on me up close and personal - probably less than 50 yards. Always watch out for the quiet ones. I got no problem having a gun pointed at me, but that cussing and yelling at me I take a little personal and it rattles cage. I don't take personal beration well at all. I probably hit a 10 on the adrenaline meter that time. Probably just short of soiling my drillies.
Turns out I became friends with the quiet one and he warned me about "this other guy". I told him we had already met and that it wasn't pleasant by any stretch. He laughed and said "yeah, that would be my brother. Tread lightly around him.". Gee, ya think!!! They were a couple miles apart but part of the same project. Talk about a small world.
In the end it all worked out and they both offered much help locating certain monuments. No one else in our crew would have anything to do with these fellers so that fell on me. That worked ok as well. While they all went off to some crappy lunch somewhere, I got home-cooked lunch and drinks and invited over anytime. I think it weirded out my buds that not only did I turn a potentially deadly situation into one of friendship.
Completely unrelated (non-surveying) I have been shot at before. There is a good reason to say "don't mess with the farmer's daughter". 😉 Didn't stop her from messing with the pharmacist's son however. We ended up getting married. Don't know if he ever knew it was me he was shooting at that night. Not sure if he was really trying to hit me but some shots hit REAL close. Might as well sign me up for a Tet Offensive Part II.
I was hoping the "survivors will be shot again" sign made people nervous like you described.
The alternative is "Trespassers will be violated" sign. I just didn't think that would keep the creeps away.