Buried object locator apparatus with safety lighting array

1. A device for locating buried or hidden objects, comprising:

a locator body including a mast;

one or more antenna nodes coupled to or on or within the body; and

a safety lighting assembly disposed on the mast for generating substantially planar output light in a plane parallel to the ground surface when the device is positioned in a vertical orientation.

2. The device of claim 1 , wherein the safety lighting assembly comprises a plurality of LED light units for generating fan-shaped substantially planar light beams.

3. The device of claim 2 , wherein the LED light units comprise a high power LED element, a reflector element, and an optic to form the fan-shaped beam pattern.

4. The device of claim 1 , wherein the body comprises an integral body.

5. The device of claim 1 , wherein at least one of the one or more antenna nodes is a dodecahedral antenna node including twelve antenna coils.

6. The device of claim 5 , wherein the dodecahedral antenna node comprises an upper half shell and a lower half shell, and wherein each of the upper half shell and lower half shell includes six of the antenna coils.

7. The device of claim 6 , wherein the six antenna coils are configured as five antenna coils equally distributed around a vertical axis and one centered antenna coil.

8. The device of claim 5 , wherein at least one of the one or more antenna nodes comprises a gradient antenna node including a plurality of orthogonally arranged antenna coils and a pair of gradient antenna coils.

9. The device of claim 1 , wherein at least one of the one or more antenna nodes comprises a gradient antenna node including a plurality of orthogonally arranged antenna coils and a pair of gradient antenna coils.

10. The device of claim 1 , further comprising a plurality of GPS antennas coupled to or on or within the body.

11. The device of claim 10 , wherein the plurality of GPS antennas are disposed in an upper antenna node positioned above the one or more antenna nodes and below a head unit.

12. The device of claim 11 , further comprising a plurality of GPS sensors coupled to the plurality of GPS antennas.

13. The device of claim 10 , wherein the GPS antennas are patch antennas disposed on a printed circuit board.

14. The device of claim 13 , wherein the GPS antennas consist of three patch antennas.

15. The device of claim 10 , further comprising one or more ISM antennas coupled to or on or within the body.

16. The device of claim 1 , wherein the safety light assembly includes a processing element, wherein the processing element controls the light output from the plurality of LEDs in a predefined output light pulse pattern.

17. The device of claim 16 , wherein the predefined pattern consists of a pulse train of light outputs followed by an off period.

18. The device of claim 17 , wherein the pulse train consists of three output light pulses followed by the off period.

19. The device of claim 1 , wherein light outputs of the safety light assembly are controlled by a processing element in a head unit so as to provide a predefined output light pulse pattern.

20. The device of claim 1 , further including a camera and a surface light assembly coupled to or on or within the body.

21. A buried utility locator, comprising:

a locator body;

one or more antenna nodes coupled to or on or within the body;

electronics in the locator body for detecting a buried utility and displaying information associated with the buried utility on a visual display;

and a safety lighting assembly including a plurality of LED lighting elements distributed in an array around a mast element of the locator body to provide overlapping pulsed light output in a substantially planar orientation parallel to a ground surface when the locator is positioned in a vertical orientation.