just wanted to share some thoughts.

gump

over the last 10 years i have heard of so many small,minor, near miss accidents, and there are probably many that dont get mentioned, for what ever reason.
we SHOULD be telling someone, when something nearly happens.

i have been traveling the globe a fair bit in the last 3 years, and have met alot of people in our industry, and to be honest its really scary to hear about all the people that have had broken backs from falling from trees, once again, for what ever reason.

i now know 3 people personally, and man, that just plain sucks, and i think its 3 people too many.

its great to have sites (cheers ekka) like this where people can share the unfortunate events that can occur with our job, but it is all really great information!
we can all learn from these unfortunate errors, and become better arborists and people for it!

so, PLEASE, just be careful out there.

jim1nz

Nice one Scotty.

It is insane and it can happen to anyone if you push things too far when ya know its risky.

I know of more than 3 broken backs in just one company of a city Scotty and myself have worked in...

Eric Frei

3 in one place!

How the hell could that have happened?

Did they all happen the same way?

Was it gear failure or human error or tree failure?

Or were they humping out too heavy a log?

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gump

yeah your correct jim, thinking about i do know more than 3!
how does it happen...... as i said, for what ever reason.
but i guess the most common one would be complacency! "not following the rules". kind of stupid really!!

those of us that have been doing it for a while do know the "rules", and ill put my hand up for being one that has been known for bending those rules at times, but i fell confident that i know when the limit is for me, and the tree. in saying that, anyhting can happen at any time.
after hearing about more and more of these incidents, i have certainly been more assertive with making solid, positive decisions towards safety in my actions aloft.

i hope others can do the same!

Knotahippie

I know one guy, dead pine, broken back, now a pool guy.

One guy polesaw blade pinched/snapped, broken neck, now a grounds dude.

My good friend, two decayed oaks, broken arm 25 yrs. ago. and broken leg and front teeth 5 yrs. ago.

Just last year, dead alder top fell, lead climber on a friends crew killed.

Alot of objective and subjective hazards in the trees.

letigre

nice one mate. i also think it should be mentioned that tree guys are already predisposed to being 'hell cats' or adrenaline junkies and as a result do not need the added pressure of jeering mates. i know lots of ppl, myself included once upon a time, that would attempt something that they may not be capable of because of a fear of what their mates may think. bad ju ju happens when this mentality is in the air.

so anyway in a nutshell; 'be smart, be safe and more importantly know your limits and when to quit'. shows more courage admitting your wrong or not able to carry out a task than risking your neck and fluking it. back yourselves dudes

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Willard Holmen

I myself having a few near death experiences over the years makes me think of one that always sticks in my mind. About 25 yrs ago I was falling a large 30 metre tall white spruce when my saw ran out of gas before finishing the backcut. Thinking I still had lots of hingewood left I left the tree standing and walked over to my gas can to refuel, on the way back to the tree I walked out to do a little limbing/topping on previous felled trees near the standing cut one. A gust of wind blew the cut one down missing me by less then a metre, unbelievable blast of wind comes of a tree of that size when your that close.
The large forestry company I was working for at the time had a safety policy where anyone caught leaving cut trees standing would be sent home for 3 days with no pay, 3 warnings your fired.
So yes workplace safety regulations are very important, because 2 fallers I knew who were killed by the same way I almost was. The only difference they were working for a contractor with no safety regulations in place and just took too many chances.

Bruce Hopf

Hey, when it comes down to anything, working with Trees are very Dangerous. I fell a few Trees along an old lane way, that had run down the center of the farm, and the new Owners wanted the Trees cleared out so that they could turn this lane way into Field and grow crops.
I was hired to do the Work of the felling, and cutting the Trees into Fire wood. Everything was going OK with the Felling, when the last Tree I fell didn't fell where I wanted it to fell.
The treed was leaning heavier to on side, and I missed Judged it. When I finished cutting the Tree, and I had to use more Wedges to fell it. Well that tree took a quarter of a turn on that stump, and fell on top of another tree that I just had fell before this one.
No problem I thought, so I proceeded to start doing the Liming of the two trees, and cutting them up into foot wood. What I didn't realize, was that one of the Branches of the bottom tree was sprung, and when I cut through a Limb of the tree that was on top of the other tree, that Limb sprang back, up over the Bar of the Chain Saw, which I was lucky, and hit me right square in the Mouth, snapping off the first top front teeth.
That was before I had heard of Safety Shields like what we have today, and I feel that if I would have had one of the Safety Helmets like I have now, I would still have my teeth, but probably would have had a Broken Nose instead. I figure that the Face Shield would have spread the shock of the Limb over the Face Shield. Bruce.

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