What does this mean ? Someone is operating a backhoe and there is a loud KLUNK and the operator looks at what it hit and says to him/herself jeez I'm lucky to still be alive ?
Most of the time, the lawsuits for digging up someone's fiber optic cable or natgas line are so staggering that there are various "free" one-call services that mark buried objects. The public utilities all pool resources to fund it, so it's free in the sense that your utility bills pay for it. I know a guy who had a gig doing that and in addition to locate devices that are kind of like a giant telco wire toner, they do indeed sometimes walk around with a literal metal detector. Doesn't work very well on terracotta sewer pipe but those generally collapse in a couple decades as I've found out the hard way.
Anyway, yeah, a dude with a metal detector walking around with a map of buried pipes in one hand saying "that's odd there's not supposed to be a pipe here"...
http://www.uniindia.com/news/world/people-france-wwii/233733...