[AMPS] "the old days"

[AL_LORONA@HP-USA-om33.om.hp.com]

     Hi, everybody,
     
     John, you asked for the war stories, and I have one which, although 
     not an amps tale, I think ranks at least in the top 100 scary ones.
     
     Several years ago, an elderly ham contacted us electronics teachers at 
     a poor, private high school in Southern California. He wanted to 
     donate his entire antenna system to our ham club. We showed up on 
     Saturday morning in a U-Haul, giggling like little girls when we got a 
     load of his 100-foot tower and gigantic multielement array sitting 
     atop it.
     
     Merrily, we headed for the backyard. With one person manning each of 
     the guy points on the ground, two guys on the roof carefully climbed 
     the (crank up) tower to remove the metal jambs and generally free up 
     the sticky sections.
     
     Once that was done, our generous friend attached the manual crank to 
     the winch and began lowering the huge monstrosity, inch by inch, to 
     the lucky recipients, wagging their tails and panting impatiently to 
     dismantle the prize.
     
     All of a sudden, something went very wrong. I remember getting the 
     most sickening feeling in my stomach. The winch was spinning wildly, 
     the antenna was coming down way too quickly and -- what are those 
     power lines doing? Oh no, did the two guys on the roof get clear of 
     the tower? It's falling, falling...
     
     There I was, holding a metal guy wire, cowering under a shower of 
     sparks, confusion, the "blam! blam! blam!" of the crashing tower 
     sections, the blinding flashes of light. Live wires falling all around 
     me. I am very lucky to be alive. We are all lucky someone wasn't 
     killed.
     
     I still get chills thinking about that day.
     
     The handle had slipped off the crank and out of the OM's hand. With 
     nothing to stop it, the tremendous weight of the tower sections went 
     into free fall, all the way to the ground, and the tips of the 20 
     meter elements contacted the power lines on the way down, burning off 
     in the process and severing a 12 kV power line which landed a few feet 
     from me. Can you believe this? To this day, I hate crank up towers and 
     distrust them.
     
     There were so many things that we did wrong that day, and so many 
     opportunities for us to have been harmed, but our guardian angels 
     would have none of it. Still, what a way to learn a lesson.
     
     While you're practicing safe homebrewing on your amps, guys, don't 
     forget to carry that same mentality of total safety when you're out on 
     the antenna farm.
     
     R,
     
     Al
     


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