Critique this vid by local company

rbtree

See how many safety violations (USA ANSI Z.133 reg's) and rigging gaffs you can find.

Then guess as to how many and what kind of accidents this company has had just in the last month.

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Eric Frei

I'm guessing struck bys for the ground crew.

The first tree Roger, looked like the top was cut off and it sprouted bit of an epicromic the guy went up and lowered off of, is that right? Are those types of pines pretty strong on regrowth like that?

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rbtree

That's a Douglas-fir....super strong, resistant to post topping decay....

That outfit has had three accidents recently. Fairly good young climber, who's worked a bit for me, who needs lots of training, rapped off the end of his rope, fell ~30 feet...lots of trauma....a few days later, some dufus endo'd a log into the side of a house, then a groundie almost got chipped. Pushing material into chipper with foot, it was caught, crushed somewhat and torn off part of a toe....co-worker rushed to reversed feed, saved his life......

I'd posted a tough comment, then, oddly enuf, was on the phone with Oxman, who'd taken flack for his Ekka style video of another company -last November, when my cell rang. Turns out it was the co. owner. I didn't listen to his message till just now.......he pulled my comment and asked me to call him directly. I will...but to repeat my suggestion that he hire my buds with STARRS for personal jobsite training. The local STARRS guy is Dave Stice, who's featured in my "famous" Squeeze Play video.

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rbtree

There's so many cock-ups in that vid, it's pathetic....

Now that others are posting critical comments, he should pull it. He should have known that airing that in public was ridiculous....far worse than videos from others that just have one or two things to criticize...some of mine included.

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Eric Frei

Climber should be tying that block using the cow hitch, I'll post a comment there

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Garry Brockley

I dont see why he climbed onto that epicormic he could have lowered it from the main upright, he seemed tentative around the saw but that could be because of the camera.
where are the groundies helmets? dont you guys wear them on the ground?
other wise it came down safely-ish and didnt break anything, no-one was injured or died at the job so i guess its a good day for them.

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rbtree

Galbee, I explained to ekka that new doug fir tops are super strong. (Heck, I'd climb into 3 inch wood on a regrown top if needed.) As well, each top was too bulky to lower whole, given the drop zone.

Ya'll have missed several glaring mistakes.

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Garry Brockley

Rb thats not what i was saying, he lowered larger pieces further down and didnt do the same to the top thats all.

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FlashD

The guys from a STARRS are a good suggestion. I've worked with Greg Lui and Tracy Fitzgerald, both standup guys. I learned so much in a week working with Greg.

rbtree

You're forgetting that the top was brushy....didn't ya see the drop zone? It had shrubbery obstacles.

His real mistakes were:

Failure to set the block as close as possible to the cut to be made. The worst section had to freefall at least 8 feet before it came onto the line...and it's center of mass probably fell a good 14 feet. Had the groundies not done a good job of letting the loads run, the forces generated could have been as high as 15,000 lb.
Failure to tie a proper cow hitch, and make it tight.

Placing his single tie in below the sling and above the block, which effectively trapped him until the loads were untied.

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Garry Brockley

They were noticed but i figured he must be a new climber anda novice ground crew those are things that come with experience.

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