What unusual thing(s) have you seen while on a site inspection?

[otterpop]

Living and working in the rural West I encounter things a lot of planners in urban areas will not: pronghorn antelope, mule deer, ranch dogs, rattlesnakes, cactus, and a lot of barbed wire. Once I came upon the Native American burial site of a boy who died in the early 20th century.

I think the oddest thing for me was coming upon a badger rather suddenly. If you have never heard a badger, you have not heard one of the bone-chillingest sounds known to man. Sort of a fierce growling scream. Scared the hell out of me.

I was doing an inspection for subdivision review on a large parcel and I heard digging. When I got close, out of a hole pops a badger growling and screaming. He sees me and charges. Low, squat, intense and fierce they are. I backed the hell out of there (as scary as a badger is coming at you, it is even scarier to have one behind you). Thankfully he scampered back to his hole, but stayed topside to growl at me more.

What have you seen out of the ordinary and noteworthy?

[ThePinkPlanner]

Homeless camps are common on the wooded sites, even here in the frozen north. During the day, they are largely empty, so you get a good insight into the camps. Still, I don't venture to those sites alone.

I've seen randomly hung undergarments once, even though there was no homeless camp in sight. Hung out with clothespins and everything.

[Dan]

When I was working in Florida, a house that just started on fire. Really. A young boy died in it. I encountered a lot of peacocks and roosters at that job, too. Never a gator, fortunately.

A couple of weeks ago, there was the cat that greeted me like a dog, chirping and meowing. Followed me all around the place, and I thought it was going to jump into my car when I left.

During my first job in New Mexico, I met with the owners of an adult bookstore to help them find an appropriate site for a relocation. At the bookstore itself. I'm rolling out maps on top of a display counter filled with sex toys, behind which was shelves loaded with rubber penises. Despite that, it was a very professional meeting.

[ColoGI]

Verifying FPA permit compliance, a man at least 80 years old lugging a chainsaw with a bar that must have been 5 feet long. Lots of good stories about living in the woods during the Depression.

[Bubba]

Never a gator, fortunately.

Site visit last year looking at possible locations for a new tower at Southwest Florida International Airport (Fort Myers):

[otterpop]

During my first job in New Mexico, I met with the owners of an adult bookstore to help them find an appropriate site for a relocation. At the bookstore itself. I'm rolling out maps on top of a display counter filled with sex toys, behind which was shelves loaded with rubber penises. Despite that, it was a very professional meeting.

That's great.

[Dan]

Site visit last year looking at possible locations for a new tower at Southwest Florida International Airport (Fort Myers):

Beats the critter that followed me around a couple of weeks ago.



Anyone ever come across stills, marijuana patches, or the like? What's your policy if you stumble across something that's felony-level illegal during a site visit?

[Maister]

Did a site inspection one time to look behind what used to be an old 'Yankees' department store and found lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots of what appeared to be dried blood splattered all over the pavement.

edit: I won't ruin the atmosphere by telling what it actually was. Let's just let it linger there.

[Bubba]

Anyone ever come across stills, marijuana patches, or the like? What's your policy if you stumble across something that's felony-level illegal during a site visit?

I've run across both. As a consultant, my policy is generally:

1. Get the hell out of there as quickly as possible by the same route you came in.
2. Notify the client agency of the presence of illegal activity in their project area.

[dissent]

I've come across plenty of bongs with my residential inspections. The best are hoarder homes, the worst ever was a feces littered home where litterally a path had to be swept through piles of feces to walk through the home. The smell was so bad I held my breath to enter, take quick photographs, then darted back outside for air.

[kms]

I was inspecting an earthmoving site on a January day and saw a man in very short cutoffs standing in a muddy patch. He was mashing the mud around with his feet. He is a frequent visitor to muddy places where he smears the mud on his legs because he says that he has a skin condition and the mud soothes it. He's been all around the county, and has been removed from places in police cars and ambulances.