Asset Management proven to be undermined by poor pole condition data

This month as Thor Poletest™ Ltd updated the market that it’s condition data achieved an impressive 93.8% accuracy, confronting statistics from a network report have surfaced.

In a 2021 report produced by an Australasian Lines Company (name withheld) for its regulator, a massive 75% of all pole failures were found to involve poles that at their last traditional inspection (Sound dig and Drill) were deemed to be ‘safe and serviceable’. It follows that the efforts of asset management professionals in protecting network performance as well as public safety are being heavily impacted through a reliance on significantly flawed data. Whilst refusing to name the network concerned Thor Poletest™ General Manager Mark Thompson commented that “This isn’t an issue for any single network, it is an inconvenient truth representative of all networks grappling with the management of ageing timber pole networks”.

Mr Thompson added that “As a bow wave of potential pole replacements presents both a safety and economic issue for many networks, we are excited to see new and sophisticated asset management and planning practices being utilised by them. Unfortunately what is further confirmed by this report is that you can only ever be as good as the data that you have at your disposal, and that a lot of that data is extremely poor”.

The Thor Poletest™ TH320P System provides field inspectors with a simply 60-second test that gives them a pole condition traffic light (Green, Amber, Red) that is proven 93.8% accurate through subsequent breakage testing.