Life without a safety line

We've always hired well-trained, highly professional tree crews when there was high-risk tree work to be done here. What they do, and how they go about it, is truly impressive indeed. Well worth the money for the danger involved, not just to themselves, but the people and property below.

I've also seen a neighbor hire a guy he got off f'book for 200 bucks, who showed up in a pickup truck with one buddy, a chainsaw off the shelf at a big-box store, and a single length of rope to take down a massive, dangerously unstable tree he had no business touching. It was a minor miracle he didn't get himself (or anyone else) killed.

Risk is best when it is managed well; One stands a much better chance of survival if one takes the time to do one's homework, and secure the right equipment for the task at hand.

And that translates into less worry after the fact.

 

Coincidentally, on my walk this morning I stopped to watch a large tree being felled by a construction crew, not a professional arborist. I recorded it on video. The way they did it looked very sketchy. Yet they were obviously being very careful. They were using a backhoe and a grader with cables tied to the tree to pull it in the right direction at the right time. Somehow they pulled this off with no problems.

 

Some people get through life by the grace of God alone and some people pick up the slack and help each other through it.

 

I'm unafraid of risk but don't gamble. If that makes any sense at all.

 

Man, I also saw a tree fall today. The park service was felling some dead ones at the marina. Say, that reminds me.
Once when I was camping in the Sierra Nevada, my wife and I were sipping coffee and all of a sudden we hear this crackling. About 50 yards away this big tree, maybe 80 feet, was falling down. We looked over in time to see it hit the ground....we felt it too. It was long since dead and just shattered when it hit. It was cool.

 

To pay for college, I worked tree removal for several summers. It is incredibly dangerous. If you don't know exactly what you're doing, it's just a matter of time before you get injured or even killed.

A funny thing about safety lines - using them introduces additional hazards that must be accounted for. A large branch weighing thousands of pounds could snag on the saftey line you're attached and rip you out of your perch and slam you violently to the ground.

As @slobake said, ropes are used to keep tree limbs from abruptly plummeting down when cut. The plan is to control the pieces of the tree and to lower them slowly to the ground without endangering people or property. Unless you have lots of experience at this, it's very easy to let a massive tree branch start to fall, and then abruptly swing sideways, like a giant baseball bat.

Check YouTube to see countless examples of amateur tree jockeys being knocked out of trees by branches swinging wildly on "safety" lines.

While there, also check out how often people grossly underestimate the weight of a tree and use ropes that are of inadequate strength. if a tree is leaning one direction and you want it to fall in a different direction, it's a really, really bad idea to go to the nearest hardware store and buy 50' of whatever ⅜" rope is the cheapest and expect it to keep many tons of wood from landing on someone's house (or head).

A difficult and as dangerous as that job was, I believe that it taught me a lot about self discipline and risk management. I was young and single and liked to stay out to 2am and party, but when I knew I had to work tree removal the next day, I forced myself to stay home and go to bed early and get a food night's sleep. Hanging 60' up a dead tree with a running chainsaw in your hand is not something you want to do with a hangover.

 

Who is Jimmy?

 

It makes perfect sense. I spent years in construction and road races motorcycles. It is all calculated.

But I don't like tort. And as an adult who escaped a childhood that included TNC with potato chips on top, I only eat tuna out of the can or as sushi.

 

You can do that???

Thank you.

 

Reported to @slobake !

 

He can have some too.

Probably the lack of a potato chip topping has been his problem all along.

Time to throw in the potato chip life line.

 

Never under estimate the weight of those branches, they are far heavier than you think they are. If you were to be hit with one you would probably never know what hit you, lights out , the end.

I have done a bit of this in my own back yard and have seen the result of a seemingly small limb hit the top of my chain link fence, you wouldnt want that to be your head...no sir

 

I wont hold your fear of tort against you. TNC... is unfortunate. Just make it a spread, moist not wet, and put it on my damn bread. Please.

 

You can have all the TNC. Salami is for sandwiches. Mmmmm!

 

My favorite sandwich is old school. A Monte Cristo... sammich perfection!

 

I think that taking chances is all we ever do, whether we realize it or not. Sometimes we get toward the end of our lives and realize that what passed for playing it safe was just fear of the unknown, or fear of our own vulnerability, or fear of rejection, or fear of commitment and complacency, or something similar to all of that. Really, there are never any guarantees. We get up in the morning and walk out to our cars every day with the same odds we'll never make it home.