When you have one or more people per battalion responsible for refreshing the fills, the logistical nightmare isn't that bad.

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.

F'ing rediculous that anyone would demolish a house based on a gps location... crazy.

This is not by accident.

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@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.

I'm not particularly fond of Earth, but I really haven't been anywhere better.

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!

@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?

@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.

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.

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.

I'm not sue-happy, but I would SOOOOOO call a lawyer. I hope the company gets kicked in the ass.

@Skaperen: You know what would have been better (and shorter) than a matching description? An address...

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."

I hope the homeowner sues the demolition company right off the face of the earth.

@SybilDisobedience:
"That company must be mortified at the mistake they made."

Company: "It is a heartbreaking tragedy of financial proportions."

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.

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]

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.

@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".

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.

@Corporate_guy: Not to be picky, but what are "GPS confidantes?" Or are you referring to GPS coordinates?

@xtc46 - thinksmarter on twitter:

Generally you cant get position data with less than 3 satellites.

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.

@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.

@edwardso: They were planning to use the house for a family reunion.

@Shoelace: Not just address, but all these demolishing procedings should have to use the same lot number system used by city housing authorities.

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.

@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.

@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.

@pecan 3.14159265: On purpose even. Civilian GPS is accurate to like 100m, while Army GPS is accurate to like 3m.

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.

"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'."

@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.

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.

@AlexDitto: Ah, good. I was waiting for someone to chime in with this.

@El_Fez: He also took a wrong toin at Albookoikee.

@MikeF74: I'm betting the homeowners insurance would find a way to make it an "act of God".

And frankly, any demolition company that is that negligent in making sure they knock down the right structure needs to be sued to oblivion.

Or for 2k, 3-5 meters, which is accurate enough to prevent demolition of the wrong house.

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.

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.

@Smashville: Because ... unmaintained houses are kept maintained?

Shocking! I bet the workers didn't know how to use GPS because GPS NEVER lies! It's always correct! ;)

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.

@kaceetheconsumer: Except their Galactic Positioning System (GPS) will inadvertantly point them to destroy Venus instead and we'll all be saved.

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.

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.

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.

@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.

@Gokuhouse: You might wanna re-read. The house is vacant.

Wouldn't they have had to apply for a demolition permit?

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."

@nakedscience: Also, if it was unmaintained, then how come the yard man was there?

@breese524: 20 or 30, depending on who you talk to.

@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.

@joeblevins: Oh this is so getting disemvoweled.

I would have said "Someone is about to get Demolished."

@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.

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?

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.

"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!

@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.

@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

@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.

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.

@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.

@edwardso: Furniture? I'm wondering if they even verified if there were any people in the house.

@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.

@edwardso: You have to wonder what now?

@YouDidWhatNow?: It shouldn't happen but I'm not at all surprised.

Is there such a thing as a demolition permit from the city? If not, perhaps there should be.

What idiots. They should probably have their license revoked.

@OMG? BigPapaCherry doesn't get it?: It's happened quite a few times, actually. It just usually doesn't get big headlines

I hear the plans had been filled and were freely viewable at the main office on Alpha Centauri...

What an awful thing to happen.

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.

What a terrible story, but I have to wonder did they verify that any furniture was in the house?

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.

@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.

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.

@SybilDisobedience: If by mortified you mean preparing for a huge lawsuit then yes they are mortified.

Someone is about to get sued into oblivion...

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.

Didnt this happen to Bugs Bunny once? The correct response can only be "Of course you know, this means war!"

Wow, how awful. What a shame they lost all those priceless family heirlooms. That company must be mortified at the mistake they made.

And don't get me started on my parents getting lost everytime they come to my house even though they have GPS.

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.