How Many Tons can You Shovel by Hand in 1 Hour / 1 Day

How Many Tons can You Shovel by Hand in 1 Hour or 1 Day

This is a quick note to say how many tons a fit healthy strong(ish) person can shovel in 1 day if properly motivated.

Recently I received 16 metric tons (16,000kgs) of crushed lime stone delivered tipped out of a lorry in to a heap. I manged to load this in to wheel barrows with a normal shovel during 7 hours of shovelling.

This would give an approx rate of 2 tons per hour, with a short walk included to empty the wheelbarrow. A few notes from this example:

• The Gravel was Easy to Shovel (30mm max gravel size) 
• The gravel was spread over a 30 meter long drive way.
• I am a well fed, 90kg bloke who keeps fit.
• You can shovel 16 tons in one day.

I am not sure if I could have repeated this the following day! But I dare say you would get used to the work after a couple of weeks!

I worked as hard as this for my own benefit, it was stressful and I was exhausted afterwards. I would not expect one of my employees to move the same amount. 

Environmental Consultants London