OSHA Standard 29 CFR Part 1926 Subpart P is the part of the Federal Standard that deals with excavations. Under 1926.652 “Requirements For Protective Systems” it is stated: “(1) each employee in an excavation shall be protected from cave-ins by an adequate protective system designed in accordance with paragraph (b) or (ac) of this section except when (i) Excavations are made entirely in stable rock; or (ii) Excavations are less than 5 feet (1.52m) in depth and examination of the ground by a competent person provides no indication of a potential cave in”.

To summarize, if you create an excavation that is not in solid rock and is more than 5 feet deep, you are required to protect workers from potential cave ins. To achieve the necessary level of protection for your workers you can SLOPE, SHIELD or SHORE:

• SLOPING – the method by which the walls of the trench are cut back at a ratio to the depth of the trench to insure the trench walls cannot collapse into the trench.
• SHIELDING – the method by which a solid structure is placed inside the trench to “shield” a worker in the event of a trench wall cave in.
• SHORING – the method by which devices re-insert energy back into the trench walls to create a positive physical restraint to prevent trench wall cave in.

All three of these methods have their pros and cons. No one single method will address all of the many possible combinations of trenching conditions. The one common thread of these three methods is the need for the “system of choice” to be designed by a Registered Professional Engineer. To have a Registered Professional Engineer design a shoring plan is time consuming and expensive. The obvious answer to this problem is to use a pre-approved trench shoring method when ever possible. This is where we can help you. We have many pre-approved trench shoring devices to address your trench excavation safety needs. Each device will be delivered with a Tabulated Data Sheet that specifies the engineered rating of that specific device.