Is your high point above or below the rigging point?

ronnyb

I have a friend who broke out the leader he was tied into and also the rigging point. It failed at the crotch about 15 feet below him. He took a 40 foot fall, broke his back, legs, etc off of work for over a year.. I try to never rig out of the lead that I'm tied in to.

newguy18

I'm not condemning anyone but if you think for a minute a piece of wood is gonna break the leader or might cause the rigging to fail you should take a smaller piece,a little extra time is better than being out of work or being dead.

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Bermy

See now, for blocking down, I was taught to have the rigging below the tie in.
The thought being that if the rigging slips a bit it won't slip into your tie in, also rigging won't be running across your lifelines or the block banging into them either.

I've done some 80' Norfolks, rigged down two of them, (the rest were chop and drop) but I was in a high lift. Watching the rigging, there is no way I'd be happy tied in below.

For that single leader scenario, its a case of eyes on the scene...which part of the tree will be better able to withstand the shock loads, common sense would say lower=thicker=stronger.
Any time you are limited to having the same leader for tie in and rigging, small sections and no/low shock loading should be the way to go.

I agree with those who say that students should be taught to THINK! Teaching is usually to 'best practice' standard but you have to be able to know when to adapt to unique situations, and to realize when things are not safe and might require a re-evaluation, more equipment, second opinion, come back another day!

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