One Georgia family is understandably distraught after the house their father built by hand was demolished without warning by a crew that says they were given GPS coordinates rather than an address. The home was currently empty — but contained irreplaceable heirlooms.
“We had heirlooms in thereÖmy mom’s dining room setÖher hutch with her dishes in there,” the homeowner told WSBTV.
The demolition company said it had paperwork.
“I said, ëPaperwork for what?’ and he said, ëFor the house, to demolish the house.’ I said, ëI’m the owner of the house, I haven’t given anybody any authority to demolish this house,’” said [the homeowner]….
“I said, ëWhat address did you have?’ and he said, ëThey sent me some GPS coordinates.’ I said, ëDon’t you have an address?’ (and) he said, ëYes, my GPS coordinates led me right to this address here and this house was described,’” said [the homeowner].
[The homeowner] said he suspects the intended target was actually across the road.
The report also said that about a month ago the power box had mysteriously been removed and holes punched into the walls. They thought it was vandalism at the time, but now think that the company was preparing to demolish the house.
Guess there’s still something to be said for an address and a map. Oh, and maybe a photo of the house would have helped, too.
Homeowner Says Crews Demolished Wrong House [WSBTV via Consumer Reports]
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How in the hell can you demolish a house based on GPS coordinates? I don’t see any possibility that you could get “paperwork” for such a job without an actual street address. I see no chance of that happening at all.
@YouDidWhatNow?: In the mean while, it is OK to bomb a target based on GPS coordinates…
@Bob Lu: Excellent point. Now this happening doesn’t seem all that unlikely….
@Bob Lu: Arguably defense satellites have more accuracy than a TomTom.
@pecan 3.14159265:
so do they get a free house now ?
@anduin: Depending on the financial state of the company they may go bankrupt and the guy will get nothing.
As for the GPS confidantes. The question is where did they get them from? My guess would be they got them from google maps using the address. The pointer probably didn’t land on a house via the address, so they dragged the pointer over what they though was the correct house and used those coordinates.
@Corporate_guy: I would hope any company doing heavy demolition would be required by law to be bonded and insured. Then again, this is Georgia, so anything is possible.
@Corporate_guy: Not to be picky, but what are “GPS confidantes?” Or are you referring to GPS coordinates?
@anduin: Yeah, good luck trying to recover the loss from this dimwitted contractor.
@pecan 3.14159265: On purpose even. Civilian GPS is accurate to like 100m, while Army GPS is accurate to like 3m.
@pecan 3.14159265: True. But there is no save if the coordinates were wrong in the first place.
@Bob Lu: The civilian GPS system is designed to be off by as much as x feet. I don’t recall what number x is. Military GPS is dead on accurate.
@breese524: 20 or 30, depending on who you talk to.
@nakedscience: @breese524: IIRC, this WAS the initial plan, but due to the ADA, they could not do it b/c then GPS units for the blind would have them walking into the wrong buildings.
Besides, even IF you encrypted it, the decryption code would be figured out very quickly, as making a synchronized code jumping device for a million+ military units would be a logistical nightmare, and as soon as one gets lost, well, you’re screwed.
@MakinSense…ForOnce_GitEmSteveDave: I should qualify that for extreme precision for perhaps a one time trip(missile) or a small fleet doing a mission, you COULD do a “one time” cypher that could be updated to certain units/devices and also changed in the satellite(s) easily. But for general naviagtion, both civilian and military, they get pretty much the same info. I mean, if someone can send a missile over here, does it really matter if they are within ~50 feet of the target rather than dead on target, as we would be notified of the incoming bogey.
@BennyMigrationWitness_GitEmSteveDave: The crypto changes monthly, and only used in active devices where precision of that magnitude is necessary, although all standard PLUGR and DAGR can take the crypto fills.
When you have one or more people per battalion responsible for refreshing the fills, the logistical nightmare isn’t that bad.
@breese524: 10 metres typical accuracy if you’re using the C/A code (coarse/acquisition; read “unencrypted civilian GPS”).
Military GPS gear is rumoured to be able to have roughly twice the accuracy (by using the higher-transmit-rate encrypted “P” code)… but you need encryption keys for that. Good luck getting the Air Force to give you those.
@breese524: Your information is outdated. GPS WAS like that, until May 1st 2000, when they turned off Selective Availability (which is the pseudorandom error that was added to GPS signals to make “civilian” GPS inaccurate). It’s no longer the case that they add that error (although there are other sources of error in GPS signals). Basically, they’ve decided that since GPS is so used in civilian applications now, they don’t have a need to do that (especially since they now also have the ability to turn it on selectivity in a geographic region).
@johnva: If I remember correctly Selective Availability was introduced to prevent the enemy in combat zones from having as accurate data as our military. Clinton signed the order to have it turned off after the Army developed a way to completely block any GPS signal in a given area except to their equipment.
As for accuracy my G1 can be accurate up to a couple feet. Many times I have been in a parking lot, started Google maps and had it show me the exact parking spot I was sitting in.
@breese524: You’re talking about “selective availability,” which was turned off during the Clinton era.
@pecan 3.14159265: I believe(though I may be mistaken) that the consumer end GPS units use the military satellites. The real difference is the precision of the computers built in to the units and the fact that the military gets the choose where the satellites are in orbit. Plus I would guess that the sensitivity of the military’s GPS devices have a better range than a TomTom.
@Psychicsword: GPS satalites broadcast two sets of information. Unencrypted, civilain information, and encrypted channel Army info. The only hardware difference between military and civilian gps is (aside from nifty options) the decryption hardware needed to access the army info. If the government had a reason to believe the enemy is using GPS for movement to or from army interests, they can disable the civilain broadcast, or make it even more inaccurate, without messing with military gps.
@silver-bolt: what most users don’t realize is that there is more to GPS than just the satellites in the constellation. The previous commenters are correct in that there are two broadcast signals, the more accurate of which is encrypted and for military use. However, the C/A code is augmented by a series of ground stations in North and South America collectively known as the Wide Area Augmentation System. They provide civilian receivers (that are enables for WAAS use) accuracy of about 1 meter. Newer civilian receivers can also improve accuracy of the base signal using parts of the encrypted signal.
@Psychicsword: The satellites are in circular plane orbits, the military can’t choose where they’ll be. No matter where you are in the world, you’re in range of at least 6 satellites, you only need 4 to have a GPS location (x,y,z,t).
Military and civilian GPS access is similar accuracy, the difference between GPS for personal use and GPS on a guided missile has to do with intertial navigation + GPS, eliminating the natural GPS errors that come from transmission and the satellites growing inaccurate over time.
GPS III will operate at a much higher frequency than the current GPS which will give the military much more accurate positioning as well as the ability to correct the cesium clocks in the satellites. GPS III will also reintroduce C/A using a different method not to interfere with civilian/commercial applications.
I’m pretty sure there are no plans to allow civilians/commercial enterprises use of GPS III satellites.
@rorschachex: I didn’t mean C/A, I meant SA, sorry for the confusion.
@Psychicsword: You are mistaken. The biggest factor in accuracy is that the military also utilizes several additional satellites that are unavailable for civilian use (encrypted signal), hence the increased reference points makes military GPS accuracy extremely precise.
This is not by accident.
@YouDidWhatNow?: It shouldn’t happen but I’m not at all surprised.
@YouDidWhatNow?: What is really ridiculous is not the use of GPS here. It’s that they apparently didn’t cross-check the information they got from the GPS coordinates.
Even if GPS were 100% accurate, it would be unacceptable to demolish a house based on that alone, because there is always the possibility of a clerical error, etc, with someone writing down the wrong coordinates, etc.
@YouDidWhatNow?: Wow, some seriously outdated GPS info here. I guess the survey unit we have that is accurate to a couple millimeters is from some alternate dimension where the military gave up encrypting this stuff years ago. And the little trimble hand held I use that is accurate to about a 30 centimeters gets that accuracy by magic. Yes, recreational units are less accurate, 15 to 30 feet. But come on people if you are going to post, try and make it based in reality.
GPS is really replacing common sense. I had a guy try to come to my office, and while he was from the area, followed the GPS’s instructions to head into Downtown Crossing (not South Boston) instead of using his brain and going over the bridge into South Boston (where he was from).
And don’t get me started on my parents getting lost everytime they come to my house even though they have GPS.
@Fuzzy_duffel_bag: I’m waiting for the first story when someone drives into a body of water a la Michael Scott of the Office because the GPS told them to.
@OMG? BigPapaCherry doesn’t get it?: It’s happened quite a few times, actually. It just usually doesn’t get big headlines
@alexcassidy: Oh lordy, I always thought that the commercial where the guy drives into a building because the GPS told him to turn was a joke. (The GPS says something to the effect of “…in X feet/blocks” after he’s crashed)
@OMG? BigPapaCherry doesn’t get it?: My GPS took me down an access road in Illinois instead of the main drag…in the dark, on an unlit street…and kept telling me to make an immediate left…which, since it was an access road without guardrails, for the next mile or so would have been the Ohio River.
@OMG? BigPapaCherry doesn’t get it?: I actually came extremely close to that happening one time. Ended up almost entirely on the sandy beach of a small lake. Thank goodness I was going slow because it had me driving down a dirt road. I knew something was wrong, but I’m glad I realized in time just how wrong it was!
@Fuzzy_duffel_bag: I’d never have been able to make it through our first year in NoVA/DC without a GPS (the roads make almost as much sense as Boston’s, pre- and during- Big Dig), but there are times it definitely hasn’t caught up to reality. They rebuilt an overpass between here and our wedding venue and no-one’s maps seem to be updated for it. Looking forward to all 85 guests getting lost in an endless loop through Alexandria…
@Fuzzy_duffel_bag: Well, according to my GPS my cousin lives in a lake.
@Fuzzy_duffel_bag: Honestly my Tomtomt works greatly and the routes it plans are very often better than my own judgment. (I have to admit I am not very good in figuring out routes.) So I can see why people tend to fall into this. Very rarely when it DOES screw up, you trust it too much to know better.
Wow, how awful. What a shame they lost all those priceless family heirlooms. That company must be mortified at the mistake they made.
@SybilDisobedience: If by mortified you mean preparing for a huge lawsuit then yes they are mortified.
@gqcarrick: I certainly hope so.
@SybilDisobedience: I’m sure they’re taking it “very seriously”
@RAEdwards: My response to that would be: What you should have taken “very seriously” was making sure you were demolishing the right house. Now you’ll be taking a lawyer, a judge and a jury “very seriously”.
@RAEdwards: They’ll probably bill the homeowner for the demolition and go do the work originally contracted so they can get paid by the company that originally ordered it … if that order was correct.
@gqcarrick: Hope that company gets demolished. There’s no excuse for what they did. At a minimum they should have had an address to cross-reference to and a contact person to call before wrecking the house.
@Shoelace: Not just address, but all these demolishing procedings should have to use the same lot number system used by city housing authorities.
@SybilDisobedience:
“That company must be mortified at the mistake they made.”
Company: “It is a heartbreaking tragedy of financial proportions.”
Didnt this happen to Bugs Bunny once? The correct response can only be “Of course you know, this means war!”
@El_Fez: He also took a wrong toin at Albookoikee.
@El_Fez:
+1 for the bugs bunny reference.
I wonder what type of GPS unit they were using, because if it cost anywhere under $200, it likely only gives an accuracy of about 20 feet. On a day with bad satellite reception, this can be make far, far worse. Hell, on a bad enough day, even an expensive Trimble unit could become fairly inaccurate.
There’s something to be said for having an address that can be physically checked. Hope these people sue the ever-living hell out this demolition company.
@Quilt: My $65 GPS data logger will record me changing lane. The GPS navigation device is usually much less precise, tho.
@Quilt: It depends on your location. On the freeway, the GPS on my phone will show my lane changes in real time becasue it can calculate based on 9+ satellites at a time. In my apartment, it only gets 3-5 satellites and is usually within about 20 yards. If it only has 1-2 sats in view, it down to about 100 yards.
@xtc46 – thinksmarter on twitter:
Generally you cant get position data with less than 3 satellites.
@kayfox: You can with 2 satellites depending on where they happen to be at that instant. Depending on angles, the error can be small in one direction and huge in another. I’ve also seen bad readings that placed me 350 feet above ground.
@Skaperen: Surveyors have GPS equipment accurate to the millimeter. It’ll cost you thousands and thousands of dollars, of course.
@Quilt: The GPS could be dead on, but the map might be. Not all maps fed to the GPSes are perfect. In fact, many are off by many yards, have different (older?) address numbering, may show the road where it was originally planned (which may be 20-50 feet off from where it had to be fit into the land), etc..
There is no excuse for not having an address, and verifying that it is the correct building. It’s not like that’d be hard to do…
Well, I hope one less contractor will be operating in my state, soon.
@Quilt:
Maybe they were using the iPhone “GPS” Accurate to about a mile.
Someone is about to get sued into oblivion…
@OminousG: Close.
I would have said “Someone is about to get Demolished.”
@OminousG: Too bad they made them sign into Mandatory Binding Arbitration before they demolished their house!
How awful, did they have a permit for demo that covered the proper address based on the wrong coordinates??
And while I understand how helpful GPS can be, it seems to be taking the common sense out of following driving directions or even knowing which way is north vs. south.
@SadSam: Contractor claims they gave the sub a color photograph and address. This article has a lot more info: [abcnews.go.com]
Commercial (non-military) GPS is off by 30 feet. Assuming the coordinates were not dead center of the house, an error is easy.
@jdmba: Not true. Most GPS (except for cheap consumer models) is augmented with data correction to make it much more accurate than that.
@johnva: While commercial navigation GPS can correct itself on a map. A handheld unit that one might use to go to a precise corrdinate could be 30 ft off.
@breese524: No, there are handheld ones that have realtime correction.
@johnva: Not to mention with VRS networks, you can easily get sub-centimeter realtime accuracy with the appropriate equipment.
Or for 2k, 3-5 meters, which is accurate enough to prevent demolition of the wrong house.
@jdmba: Total Bunk there. Auto-steer systems for tractors and chemical applicators have to be incredibly precise so as not to waste product/seed with excessive overlap and not leave gaps between passes. The cheapy consumer GPS systems are the 30′ kind and most of them can correct your posistion to be within the confines of the roadway.
@MrEvil: I agree, even my iPhone gets within 17ft. Commerical grade GPS can pinpoint to within 3mm. You don’t see high resolution in Personal Nagivation devices because it would be overkill, you don’t need 3mm precision when driving on the highyway, and for Consumer applications being one or two houses off while annoying is accepable, not to mention 3mm accuracy would kill your device battery, make it much larger, and 10x as expensive.
I can’t believe that the company hasn’t said anything yet. What happened to damage control? What happened to taking it seriously?
@Rectilinear Propagation: Anything they say could well be taken as an admission of guilt. I’d be willing to bet their legal staff are telling them to keep very, VERY quiet.
@Rectilinear Propagation: I heard they have tape of the order to demolish. It starts at about 1:45 in:
This is unbelievable….and I’m sure that shortcuts were taken. I would think that the demolition company would have to go the municipality to ensure the correct section, block, lot, etc. We use these machines to save us work, rather than using brains, common sense and good old fashioned work. GPS units are supposed to be an aid to travel, we can’t check our brains into the glovebox! There’s a railroad crossing in my county that is near a major highway entrance. Some dope a few years ago actually made a right-hand turn onto the friggin railroad tracks and claimed that the GPS told him to make a right….so he DID. (Geeez, that road looks like tracks, but since the GPS says to make a right, that’s what I’m doin!!). Barely got out of the car in time, commuter train hit the car causing $100K damages to the train – which they are suing the driver for, and rightly so. Most folks driving nowadays have no business doing so.
What a terrible story, but I have to wonder did they verify that any furniture was in the house?
@edwardso: You have to wonder what now?
@edwardso: Furniture? I’m wondering if they even verified if there were any people in the house.
@edwardso: Why would it matter? They destroyed a house and various heirlooms. The house itself is valuable, even if it’s considered that the heirlooms may have held no monetary significance (only sentimental).
@pecan 3.14159265: I was speaking more to the fact that many people who go through the destruction of a home inflate the value of the items in the home. I’m not saying they are definitely being dishonest, and they should be compensated, but it sounds a little off to keep precious items in an unoccupied house that they suspected had been vandalized a month before
@edwardso: It’s possible they were in the process of moving the stuff out, or were making plans to but didn’t have a place to put it yet, and we don’t know if they upped the security once the “vandalism” was found out.
But it certainly doesn’t matter either way.
@edwardso: They were planning to use the house for a family reunion.
@edwardso: So what you’re trying to say is, that you’re not trying to blame the victim, but really you’re just going to go ahead and blame them anyway?
It’s like you’re saying, “Geez, I’m sorry to hear that your home was destroyed. But we, the Internet-jury, really need some proof that you had possessions in the house. Any sensible person (i.e., me) would have emptied the house at the first sign of vandalism. Assume fraud first, ask questions later. You know how it is.”
Wow… just… wow…
I wonder how this will work out? I have a co-workers whose neighbors purchased a foreclosure from the bank right as it was foreclosed. Problem was… the bank forgot to tell the “we’ll clean it out for you” company, who went in just after they started to move in, and hauled away all of their (boxed up) possessions.
Oh, but they had to do it; they were just making room for the new hyperspace bypass.
I hear the plans had been filled and were freely viewable at the main office on Alpha Centauri…
What an awful thing to happen.
@AlexDitto: Ah, good. I was waiting for someone to chime in with this.
@AlexDitto: Hopefully they had a towel.
@AlexDitto: Actually, I believe in this case, the plans were on display at the local planning office. In the basement with no lights and no staircase. At the bottom of a locked filing cabinet in a disused lavatory with a sign saying “Beware of the Leopard” on it.
Yeah, I’m a geek.
@RandomZero: Hrmmmn….Yellow
Glad nobody was at home, sleeping, perhaps hard of hearing…
Depending on the size of the companies involved, I wouldn’t be surprised to see them simply file bankruptcy and the family will get nothing. The owners of course will reform another corporation and they will go on their own merry incompetent way.
@greatgoogly: I was thinking along the same lines. If it’s some tiny demolition company with little to no insurance, then the owner could be out of luck. I wonder what his homeowner’s insurance would cover? Hopefully his homeowner’s insurance takes care of it ASAP, and it is them who is left to sue others.
@MikeF74: I’m betting the homeowners insurance would find a way to make it an “act of God”.
@Major-General: I’m betting the homeowners insurance would find a way to make it an “act of God”.
As Commander-In-Chief, Obama is head of the military, and hence military property (GPS Satellites). And being the Savior, he is God. Ergo, the GPS sending the demo crew to the wrong location was due to an act of God.
@greatgoogly: Generally speaking I’m pretty sure Demolition contractors have to put up a very sizable bond AND carry a hefty insurance policy. Bankruptcy won’t protect them from losing that bond if the homeowners sued.
@greatgoogly: If the property owners were quick, maybe they could’ve “padlocked” or otherwise made the equipment immobile and refused to let the equipment be removed from their premises, i.e., possession = attachment, pending settlement.
What idiots. They should probably have their license revoked.
I’m not from Georgia, but in the two states I’ve lived notices need to be affixed to properties well before actual demolition.
I wonder if the man actually lived there. His lawn care guy is the one who noticed the electrical box missing and holes drilled. His cousin called him late at night to let him know what happened. I have a feeling the house was vacant (perhaps since the passing of a family member or something). If that was the case, then such notices would likely go unnoticed.
Still, none of that excuses the demolition company (and whoever hired them and passed along nothing more than GPS coordinates). For this guy’s sake, I hope it was a large company with deep pockets so he gets an appropriate settlement.
Is there such a thing as a demolition permit from the city? If not, perhaps there should be.
Perhaps most distressing:
“Moore tried to contact the Texas company, but her calls have not been returned.”
I can picture some frazzled exec hiding under his desk as the phone rings above him. If you don’t pick up, they can’t sue you!
GPS is fuzzy, but I suspect that the estimator/rep who made the initial visit, scoped out the project & wrote down the description & coordinates was the one making the original error. The sub-contractor knocked down the house as described.
Still, a demolition permit is required that ties to a property lot number. Is it possible to get a demolition permit on your neighbor’s house?
Aiiieee, next thing we know, the Vogons are going to use something similar and come destroy Earth to make way for a hyperspace bypass!!!
@kaceetheconsumer: Except their Galactic Positioning System (GPS) will inadvertantly point them to destroy Venus instead and we’ll all be saved.
@wardawg: Curse you, I’m now cheering for the GPS!
I’m not particularly fond of Earth, but I really haven’t been anywhere better.
I wonder what the company is doing for the family in the meantime. Since they have no house to speak of I would assume they were put up in a very nice hotel. I can only imagine what the company will try to do to make things right, hopefully they really do take it seriously or they will likely be sued out business.
@Gokuhouse: You might wanna re-read. The house is vacant.
I don’t even know what to say. That is beyond insane.
Wouldn’t they have had to apply for a demolition permit?
Something tells me that there is more to this story. The house that was demolished had it’s power disconnected. So, I don’t think just the demolition company had bad information.
@breese524: Please re-read the article. The electrical box was taken off of the house in preparation for demolition, along with holes put into the walls. Whether the power was off or on doesn’t matter, people who leave their secondary residences for a period of time shut off utilities too.
@DoubleEcho: Why didn’t the family have the power box put back on the house right away? That seems really bizarre, even if the house is vacant.
Did the power company think it was vandalism, too? Did they even call the power company?
“Byrd said he suspects the intended target was actually across the road.”
Suspects? Has he contacted the owner of that house to find out? This is bizarre on multiple levels.
@GildaKorn: If it was not occupied, there was probably no urgency in having it put back. It would cost them money to put it back (the power company does not do these things for free, even if it is vandalism as the owner initially suspected). So they are just waiting for now instead of spending money to restore something they think may just be vandalized again.
Bizarre story? Perhaps. It isn’t the first time this kind of thing has happened (just the first I’ve heard of it being based on GPS coordinates). But it is NOT at all bizarre to delay repairs of what is believed to be vandalism. It might have been prudent to file a police report, but that might not have connected the effort in progress to demolish that house.
The company needs to pay up big time, fast, or pay more for both lawyers.
@breese524: Maybe the demolition company had the power company remove the electrical box. If the electrical service had been turned off during the period it was not occupied, the power company would not question this.
@breese524: Just because I have a car in my yard with the wheels taken off doesn’t give somebody the right to come along and haul it off to the crusher!
@breese524: Then the demolition company should have its lawyers say that the right house was indeed demolished, and provide paperwork to prove it, thus saving further damage to its reputation. Their silence implies that they know they made a mistake.
Sue. I’m Canadian and so usually think suing is a silly knee-jerk or excessive action, but I can’t think of anything more appropriate in this instance. Sue them for every cent you can get.
I mean, it seems like an open and shut case. A company came and bulldozed their home out of the blue. It doesn’t really matter who told them to, the fact is that they bulldozed their home.
@guspaz: The big difference would be willful or malicious neglect in this case (Or criminal neglect if someone got hurt because of this). Not so open and shut because if the court finds that the company was willfully neglectful or maliciously neglectful, the home owners could get bigger damages or punitive damages awarded.
@guspaz:
Chances are good they won’t get much of anything. If it were my company, I’d probably declare bankruptcy at a drop of a hat in a case like this. It’d be cheaper to just restart the company.
Article with more info here: [abcnews.go.com]
@floraposte: And that links to an even better article at [www.times-georgian.com]
This is at 11 Byrd Trail and the owner is named Byrd. So the street is probably named for the guy that built it. Maybe it was the first house?
I cannot pin point exactly where that house was. According to the named street on the map, all houses are on one side (a railroad track is on the other side paralleling the street). But the connector street to Cypress Circle is unnamed, and may be considered part of Byrd Trail (I also live on a street that splits with both ways having the same name and different house numbers).
You can see the satellite plus map at [wikimapia.org]
Shocking! I bet the workers didn’t know how to use GPS because GPS NEVER lies! It’s always correct!
They should sue the demolishing company, but they probably only have GPS coordinates to their headquarters, and they’re probably the wrong ones too.
But Mr Dent, the plans have been available in the local planning office for the last nine months.”
“Oh yes, well as soon as I heard I went straight round to see them, yesterday afternoon. You hadn’t exactly gone out of your way to call attention to them, had you? I mean, like actually telling anybody or anything.”
“But the plans were on display …”
“On display? I eventually had to go down to the cellar to find them.”
“That’s the display department.”
“With a flashlight.”
“Ah, well the lights had probably gone.”
“So had the stairs.”
“But look, you found the notice didn’t you?”
“Yes,” said Arthur, “yes I did. It was on display in the bottom of a locked filing cabinet stuck in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying ‘Beware of the Leopard’.”
When a house near us was demolished, it had chain link fencing put up around it beforehand, and it was clearly the house that was going to go. What happened here, and did no one on the crew see signs of something being wrong?
I feel sorry for the home owner, human error not GPS error, you can’t blame the tech.
@Richard Arblaster: Why not? If the original surveyor for the company went to the right house and entered a bad reading from his GPS, and that bad reading was later used to tear down the wrong house, then it was a GPS error. Or maybe he got the right reading and recorded it correctly, and the tear down crew’s reading was faulty.
But, they said the description also matched. We need pictures of houses around there to see how alike they may have looked. It could be the company that ordered the demolition gave good GPS numbers, and the first survey guy got to the wrong house because his GPS reading was bad, and entered a description of the wrong house which the tear down crew matched up.
They may never really know if everyone does finger pointing. It will depend on how accurate the original order was to determine who to blame. Unless those 2 companies figure it out between them and pony up for all the losses, this will be in court.
@Skaperen: You know what would have been better (and shorter) than a matching description? An address…
I just thought of a great prank! (Since apparently all I need is some GPS coords and I can have someone knock down a house.
The demolition company has no excuse. Most people have enough common sense to put two and two together (like noticing the house was full of furniture) and to double and triple check the paperwork. Screwing up might deprive someone of their home, their memories and all their possessions.
I hope the homeowner sues the demolition company right off the face of the earth.
@‚ò†Gr—èr—èr—èr—èr—è sings the doom song now!: I caught a bit of this story on the local news last night, and it sounds like the demo company is trying to pass the blame onto the inspection company.
The first inspection company with their name that pops up on google doesn’t have a working website right now, but in google cache you can see they previously boasted “SESI possesses over ten years of incident free work.” Interesting timing for their website to disappear!
I just don’t see how they could have done this without some kind of secondary verification.
I’m not sue-happy, but I would SOOOOOO call a lawyer. I hope the company gets kicked in the ass.
Guess how we decide what to blow up in Iraq.
Ahh good old GPS….
I have a relative that would follow GPS down a boat ramp and straight into the lake all the while arguing that TomTom is obviously correct.
Wow, what a shock. An empty house full of valuable heirlooms. That’s what I do when I move out of a house. I leave family heirlooms.
@Kimberly Gist-Collins: you know what I do when I see a link in a post? I read it before I comment.
Well i guess you get a new home
Stupid People !!!!! SUE SUE SUE THEM
Well at least they will own a demolition company now!
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@joeblevins: What are you talking about? Just because the heirlooms were sitting in an empty house doesn’t mean that someone didn’t want it. They may not have done anything with them yet, or had another place to put them.
“This is a little case of an unmaintained residence. “
A “little” case?! What.
“The ‘irreplaceable’ heirlooms was ‘crap that nobody in the family wanted’ a week ago. But you know they want to get paid now.”
OIC, you’ve seen this “crap” and talked to this family?
” but this family is going to try to play up the value of the crap in the house.”
WHO FUCKING CARES? The house was just DEMOLISHED on ACCIDENT and it was FULL OF STUFF.
@nakedscience: Also, if it was unmaintained, then how come the yard man was there?
@Smashville: Because … unmaintained houses are kept maintained?
@joeblevins: You’re kidding, right? They thought the first incidents were vandalism. If they filed a police report, the police might have thought it was simple vandalism too. Anyone looking into the windows could see that there wasn’t anything to be stolen (like a big screen TV), so a simple and reasonable deduction would be it was just unruly people looking to destroy something.
There’s no mention that they left the house unmaintained, nor is there any mention of how much the family treasured the items. For all you know, the parent died and the family was in the process of moving everything out, hence why there’s no furniture.
The bottom line is that regardless of the circumstances of the insides of the house, the wrecking crew went to the wrong house and the company are responsible.
@pecan 3.14159265:
Actually, this was a local news story for me. The home owner actually takes care of this house a lot. Even to the point where he hired a landscaper to maintain the yard.
He found out about the house getting demolished when the landscaper gave him a call at work and said, “uhhh, someone is destroying your house.”
@pecan 3.14159265: Or it was still going through probate, so they couldn’t legally move anything out yet. That happens sometimes.
@David Brodbeck: If you look at the ABC article, it sounds like the house was left to him and he didn’t want to get rid of it, so they just shared it among family members. And that they were getting ready to have a reunion there.
@David Brodbeck: It wasn’t an estate, though. So probate’s not really a factor here.
@joeblevins: Also, it does not at all matter what was in the house, if they actually wanted the stuff, what plans that they had for the stuff. It matters not at all. The only thing that matters is that the house was DEMOLISHED ON ACCIDENT.
@nakedscience: no, it was DEMOLISHED ON PURPOSE. Negligence like this is not an accident.
@joeblevins: Oh this is so getting disemvoweled.
@joeblevins: This did not sound like someone who was pumping up the value of the contents. This sounds like a man who is genuinely sad that family heirlooms have been lost senselessly. Courts award actual damages for property (perhaps trebble damages when gross negligence is involved). But I think they generally avoid price inflation based on sentimentality.
It wasn’t an “unmaintained residence”. They guy they hired to do the weekly yard work was the one who called the homeowner when he noticed that something was “a little different” at the house.
@joeblevins: y’know, the stuff in that house and the house itself could have been stuck in probate. Often it takes a year for an estate to get out of probate.
@joeblevins: Even assuming that, they still lost the structure itself. That has some about of monetary value (as improvements, etc) of the property.
And frankly, any demolition company that is that negligent in making sure they knock down the right structure needs to be sued to oblivion.
@joeblevins: Totally…shame on the OP for having the nerve to ask to be paid back for his stuff that some company just decided to destroy. I mean, heirlooms mean nothing to anyone, right? /sarcasm
Wow. It still surprises me, and I should know better by now, but it seems no matter what the story on Consumerist, someone, somewhere, will find a way to blame the OP.
@joeblevins: *cough*troll*cough*
@joeblevins: Yeah, honestly.
I mean if I go out on vacation for a week and nobody’s going in and out of my house, that’s clearly “unmaintained property”. Even if it’s just a day, if they’re out grocery shopping? Nobody’s home, tear it down.
What really gets me is… why was there no warnings put up in front of this house? Wouldn’t they have to at least say “WARNING: PROPERTY BEING DEMOLISHED” signs up a day or so before they tear the damn thing down? Even in the case of an abandoned building, what’s going to stop some hobo/drunk from rooming in there and getting crushed when they tear the place apart?
This company is scum and is probably going to get — rightly — sued into nonexistance.
I can’t believe the incompetency of people.
@Xkeeper:
Also, on “they just sighed when their xxxxxx was stolen/broken/whatever”… it’s called vandalism. Depending on the kind of neighborhood it is, vandalism could be fairly common (my father’s truck has been broken into repeatedly, until they caught the bastards that were doing it) … so without any sort of warning, why would they suspect any differently?
They just started demolishing a house across the street this morning. I hope they got the right one… Though I suspect that half of it being burned down a couple months ago and surrounded by police tape is a good indication that it’s the correct one.
Idiots and their GPS navigation systems. I drive a handivan part time for my Mom, and even though I’m equipped with a GPS navigation system in the van, I still rely on my map book because the GPS system sometimes can’t locate the address properly.
the person probably got the wrong coords, cuz just by one number off you could be placed in the wrong area. so its not the gps to blame it human error
I can see it now, infomercials selling “Demolition prevention services”. For only $10 a month we will monitor demolition permits and call you when one is issued on your property. Save your house, cottage, chalet and cabin from unwanted demolition… Call today.
F’ing rediculous that anyone would demolish a house based on a gps location… crazy.
Is the house insured? I don’t think this qualifies as an act of god. File an insurance claim get an apartment in the meantime. File a lawsuit for the difference, cleanup the mess and put another house there. It’s not the same but it’s a solution.
At least the demolition company didn’t start reading Vogon poetry to the OP.
So now we have to worry about our homes being errantly pinpointed by someone’s GPS, as well as worrying about wrongful credit reports. I wonder how they would have proceeded if the family had been in residence? “Sez right here your home goes down! Now do want to stay inside or watch from that vacant house across the street?” Sheeeeesh!
I couldn’t believe a company would use only GPS to find a house they’re going to demolish. I would think address AND GPS together would be used. Some addresses are hard to find and the GPS would help with that narrowing things down, but the address would help narrow it down by either seeing the numbers on the houses around it or on the house itself! Good grief! I’d be flaming mad.
Just one word, IDIOTS.