Rock Blasting Services Serving the Inland Northwest and Southwest USA

Yes. I hold the federal explosives license, and Precision Blasting, LLC is licensed for rock blasting in all seven states I work: Idaho, Montana, Washington, Oregon, Nevada, Utah and New Mexico. I pull whatever permits the job calls for before I load a single hole. Bonding is not usually required for this kind of work, but if your project needs a performance bond, I can arrange one.

I am based in Idaho and I travel. Most of my work is in the Inland Northwest: Salmon and Lemhi County, plus Coeur d’Alene, Hayden and Kootenai County. I am licensed in Idaho, Montana, Washington, Oregon, Nevada, Utah and New Mexico, so the Southwest is on the table too. Call me with your location and I will tell you straight whether I can get to you and when.

Construction blasting is the controlled use of explosives, or hydraulic expanding paste when explosives are not the right call, to break rock or concrete so a project can move forward. You need it when the rock wins: when an excavator, hoe ram or rock saw either cannot touch the material, or would burn more money in machine hours than a shot would cost. I will tell you honestly when your job has crossed that line and when it has not.

In the right hands, yes. Safe blasting is not luck, it is arithmetic: drill pattern, burden and spacing, charge weight per delay, scaled distance to the nearest structure, and the timing that ties it all together. I run those numbers before I load, and I do not fire a shot I am not confident in. That has been my standard since 2013 and it is why my safety record looks the way it does.

Vibration is controlled mostly by how much explosive goes off in a single instant, not by how much is in the ground in total. So I split the shot across delays and keep the charge weight per delay inside the scaled distance limit for your nearest structure. Where something sits close enough to warrant it, I do a pre-blast survey first. I also let the neighbors know ahead of time, because surprise is most of what people actually object to. And if your site is simply too sensitive for explosives, I have non-explosive tools that break rock with no noise and no vibration at all.

For most jobs, you are getting me. I have been working with explosives since 2013 and I keep my licensing and training current. When a job is big enough to need a crew, I bring people I have worked with and trust, and I stay on the shot myself. The loading and the firing are mine.

House pads and foundations, driveways and access roads, septic pits, utility and pipeline trenching in rocky soil, ledge and boulder removal on residential lots, site development for commercial builds, and the occasional remote job nobody else wants to drive to. Residential or commercial, one stubborn boulder or a whole hillside.

Rock. Ledge, boulders, rock shelf, oversize material. That is my trade. I do not take down houses or buildings. A simple standalone structure like a radio tower I will consider case by case, but only after I have walked the site and satisfied myself it can be done safely. Call me and we will talk it through.

I keep the shot on your property. That means proper stemming, blast mats where they are needed, and a pattern designed so the rock drops instead of flies. I control dust and debris, and I follow the state and local environmental rules that apply to your site. Around streams and ponds I am especially careful about what goes in and what comes out. If a site is sensitive enough that explosives are the wrong tool, I will say so and we will use the non-explosive route instead.

It depends on the rock, the size of the job, and how long permitting takes where you are. Drilling is almost always the longest part; the shot itself is over in under a second. I give you a realistic timeline at the on-site quote and I keep you posted as we go. We are working with nature, though, so sometimes the ground has an opinion and it takes longer than planned.

First thing: call 811 so buried lines get located before anybody digs. Beyond that, I will give you the specific guidelines for your site, which usually means securing loose items, closing windows, and bringing pets inside or off the property for the shot. Nobody is inside the blast area when I fire. I will tell you exactly where to be and when, so nothing about the day is a surprise.

Usually less than people expect. Price it honestly against a mechanical breaker: you are paying to transport the machine, an hourly rental rate, and an operator, and if the rock is hard enough that machine may never finish the job. A shot breaks it once. I quote on site for free, so you can put a real number next to the alternative before you decide anything.