For the past nine years in June, the National Utility Contractors Association has held its Trench Safety Stand Down Week for the utility construction industry. This year’s event — sponsored by NUCA National Partners National Trench Safety, Sunstate Equipment Co. and United Rentals — will occur at hundreds of job sites across the nation, reaching tens of thousands of our member’s valuable employees.
“In 2025, NUCA’s Trench Safety Stand Down is an integral part of our industry’s comprehensive safety program,” says Chris Barrett, NUCA’s interim CEO. “With the full support of OSHA, our mission to reduce injuries and fatalities in the trenches through the training of our excavation workforce continues to have a remarkable reach across the industry.”
TSSD Week is a series of organized events held by NUCA and industry professionals — both member and non-member organizations — to emphasize the message of safety around job site trenches and excavations. Companies can conduct a stand down by taking a break to have a toolbox talk or hold another safety activity to draw attention to the specific hazards related to working in and around trenches and excavations.
The event was first held in 2016 by NUCA, with the Occupational Safety and Health Administration joining as a partner a year later.
TSSD Week is used by industry safety professionals to hold safety training, educational seminars, live demonstrations of trench rescues and other activities to reinforce the important message of trench safety. Employers are encouraged to review with their employees the hazards associated with these tasks, the regulations enacted to keep them safe underground, and best practices to help keep themselves and their co-workers safe on the job site.
In 2024, more than 24,100 industry employees and first responders at over 2,100 job sites, from 507 organizations, took part in the stand down. The industry’s employees learned the importance of being safe around excavations and trenches from peers and experts alike.
NUCA and the utility construction industry members seek out measures to reduce risks on job sites, which can be a dangerous place to work if someone is unaware of its hazards. Some of the hazards include sudden cave-in or collapses, which are among the most dangerous hazards in the industry.
National reporting by federal and state OSHA programs show fatalities in trench collapses declined nearly 70% since 2022. Fatalities decreased from 39 in 2022 to 15 in 2023 and 12 in 2024. However, one accident is still too many. These accidents can be avoided with thorough training in excavation safety procedures and techniques, and the use of safety equipment such as trench boxes and supports.
Participation in TSSD has become more important in recent years, as our industry begins gearing up for more water, wastewater, broadband, electric and highway projects financed by the federal 2021 infrastructure law supported by NUCA. The industry is seeking tens of thousands of new employees to work on these projects, and every one of them will need safety training.
June 2025 is also "Trench Safety Month." NUCA devotes the entire month of June to sending out the message to the public and non-NUCA industry companies about the importance of employee safety when working underground or in and around trenches.
NUCA is again partnering in June with the Trenching Excavation Safety Taskforce to share information about staying safe in and around excavations. This industry safety professional partnership, announced in April 2023, will be promoting awareness of trench safety, the many training programs offered to industry members and to help ensure employees stay safe while building our nation’s vital core infrastructure projects.
The social media hashtag this year is #TSSD25.
