cemeteries in San Mateo, CA

How Deep Are the Graves Located in Cemeteries?

If we were to ask you how deep that you think graves are, what would your response be? There is a very good chance that you would guess six feet deep since that’s what most people have been taught. But in reality, most graves aren’t that deep these days. So then, how deep are graves located in the cemeteries in San Mateo, CA? We’re going to answer that question and a few others for you today. Continue reading to find out the truth.

How deep are graves?

Generally speaking, most graves aren’t six feet deep nowadays. Graves used to be this deep once upon a time. But in this day and age, the average grave is only about four feet deep. This is deep enough to prevent a casket in a grave from rising up to the surface during a flood. At the same time, it’s also not so deep that a grave is going to cause a sinkhole to form on top of it. Most San Mateo, CA memorial park cemeteries have found that four feet deep is the sweet spot for graves.

Why aren’t graves deeper?

Back in the day, graves were six feet deep for a pretty good reason. There were some people who would actually break into cemeteries at night and steal bodies from graves before selling them to medical facilities that would run tests on them. To help put an end to this practice, cemeteries started to bury bodies six feet deep since that made it much harder for them to steal. But over time, people stopped stealing bodies from cemeteries, which meant that cemeteries didn’t have to bury them as deep as they had before.

Can graves be deeper?

There are some instances in which graves can be deeper than four feet. For example, a cemetery will make a grave deeper than four feet when they’re planning on burying two people on top of one another. Four feet just wouldn’t be deep enough to make this a possibility, so cemeteries will typically dig graves that are twice that deep and sometimes even three times that deep. It all depends on who is going to be buried in these graves and which caskets will be used to bury them.

cemeteries in San Mateo, CA

How can you find out how deep the graves in a specific cemetery are?

If you’re wondering what approach a specific cemetery takes to burying bodies, you shouldn’t be shy about asking them. They will most likely tell you that they only dig graves that are four feet deep, but because every cemetery operates a little bit differently, they might dig graves that are deeper than that. It would be worth asking so that you know how deep a loved one will be when they’re laid to rest in a cemetery.

If you’re trying to figure out how deep the graves are in our San Mateo, CA cemetery, we can break it down for you. We can also fill you in on other information you’ll need to know about our burial processes. Give us a call today to speak with a burial specialist.

The Italian Cemetery was founded in 1899 by La Società Italiana di Mutua Beneficenza, which is the oldest, continuously-existing, Italian-American organization in the United States, established in 1858.

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