On January 13, 2020, the injured employee made a 3/4 cut into a 7-inch abandoned water pipe. An excavator operator extended the excavator bucket to push down onto the pipe and finish breaking it off. After the pipe broke loose, the excavator operator hooked the cut end of the pipe with one of the bucket's teeth and started to slide the pipe away from underneath the trench box. The pipe popped off the bucket's tooth and struck the injured employee in the leg.