[CQ-Contest] Tower safety

[wc1m73 at gmail.com]

I completely agree that failure analysis is key to reducing/eliminating accidents ("Air Disasters" on Smithsonian Channels, which focuses on the NTSB analysis of airplane accidents, is one of my favorite programs.)

But one rule I try to follow that may not directly flow from analysis is:

- Carefully plan every climb, right down to the sequence of operations and moves you and your ground crew will need to make and every tool/part you will need. Write it down, go over it several times, refine it and memorize it.

Also, make sure your ground crew thoroughly understands what need to be done.

I did this when I built my 110' Rohn 55 tower, which has three TIC rings and six antennas. Big, complicated project that required every step to be thought through. That took more time, but it was worth it. I still try to follow the rule even for small projects on the tower. Once, when planning the project to tram the top yagi I built a small model of the mast with it's existing antenna and the one I was going to place above it to plan out the moves I'd need to make to get the upper antenna past the lower antenna. I learned that it wasn't going to work unless I partially disassembled the upper antenna and assembled it on the mast. Glad I found that out before trying to raise the assembled antenna.

Of course, few if any projects go as planned, so you may have to make adjustments. But I've found that following this rule improves safety and can substantially reduce time spent on the tower. It also eliminates the all-too-common problem of getting to your work position only to find out you forgot to bring a tool or a part with you and have to climb back down and back up (if you don't have a ground person or didn't bring a rope and pulley.)

The idea is that the more time you spend on the tower, and the more climbing/moving you do, the more fatigued you'll get. That can lead to mistakes, injury or even death. 

As I get older I've been looking for ways to reduce the energy expended on the tower. I climb with a fall-arrest Y-lanyard, but it takes considerable energy to hook and unhook the leads every three steps. For that reason I've been looking into installing a safety cable, such as a Tuf-Tug. May be problematic with three Tic rings on the tower, which will still have to be climbed over, but I believe it will make climbing faster, easier and safer. Expensive? Somewhat, but not relative to the cost of the tower, antennas and my life. And no, free-climbing is not the solution for me.

I don't want to get in the middle of the full-body harness vs belt debate, but will just state that I use a Petzel full-body harness designed for industrial uses with the aforementioned fall-arrest Y-lanyard, a Petzel adjustable positioning lanyard and a short strap/carabiner attached to the waist ring for quickly clipping to the tower before placing the positioning lanyard. Weight carried up/down the tower is a big factor. The harness is lightweight compared with other industrial harnesses I've tried. I've also reduced the weight of the Y-lanyard by using a "Via Ferrata" lanyard with lighter hooks and elastic straps. I don't know if anyone climbs without a helmet these days, but if so I'd I strongly recommend against it. And it's just as important for every member of the ground crew to wear a safety helmet. I can't count the number of times I've bumped my head hard on something on the tower or dropped a tool with a crew member near the base of the tower (though I always tell them to stay away from the base unless absolutely necessary.)

Great video and great discussion.

73, Dick WC1M

-----Original Message-----
From: Edward Sawyer <EdwardS at sbelectronics.com> 
Sent: Saturday, November 16, 2019 6:59 AM
To: Jim George <n3bb at mindspring.com>; rjairam at gmail.com; James Cain <jamesdavidcain at gmail.com>
Cc: CQ-Contest Reflector <cq-contest at contesting.com>
Subject: Re: [CQ-Contest] Tower safety

Jim, Also with all due respect, these are all very serious issues that have nothing to do with body harnesses and free climbing.  Failure analysis deals with the direct cause. 

Issue one - don’t be on a tower all day.  Separate out work and know your physical limits.  Don’t climb alone.
Issue 2 - Be 100% sure what tower you are climbing.
Issue 3 - Job specific, don’t let a project take down the tower you are on.

The response of hanging up you current belt does not add to the safety of the three items listed.

I have no objection to improving safety generically.  I applaud you for doing it and think it’s a good idea.  But the action provides no increase in safety for the three listed items.

We all want to do feel good things that are in fact good overall.  But if you are going to draw specific examples of items to solve.  We need to relate the action taken with the item being solved.

Guys - I want a good relation dialog to improve safety.  It helps us all to increase safety. But saying - my action will be to buy a better climbing harness does not improve safety for virtually all of the discussed items so far.

Ed  N1UR

-----Original Message-----
From: Jim George [mailto:n3bb at mindspring.com]
Sent: Saturday, November 16, 2019 6:50 AM
To: Edward Sawyer; rjairam at gmail.com; James Cain
Cc: CQ-Contest Reflector
Subject: Re: [CQ-Contest] Tower safety

With all due respect, the discussion on climbing w/out the OSHA-approved climbing harness (Personal Protection Equipment) and/or taking any sort of risk by free climbing or being unattached at times is just foolish. You will be OK until you are not. Then you could have an accident. The data are clear.

Over forty years of tower work on my towers and those of friends, I have had three occasions where problems occurred. Once, a fellow climber passed out at 140 feet due to the length of time on the tower and resultant muscle fatigue and blood circulation; once when the base of an old sixty foot tower we were taking down, unknown to us was rusted and not secure ... both of us were able to climb down once the bottom started to rotate on the concrete pad; and once when attempted placement of a very heavy mast into the very small opening at the thrust bearing caused the gin pole to break and the gin pole and mast then bent over the top of the tower ... supported only by the rope. A fall of this heavy object could have severed the guy wires on 120 feet of 45G tower.  The first of these resulted in a 911 call and EMS emergency people who came, but actually complicated the situation because they were not trained in climbing at all, and the last one resulted in one of my friends nearly having the end of one of his fingers cut off by a sharp edge of the gin pole. We were fortunate in all three as we got down without additional injury of the loss of any towers.

For one, I'm hanging up my Klein lineman's "Bodybelt" climbing belt and not going up again until I have the proper PPE, and also am taking the pledge of slower climbing and the steps recommended by K1IR. The video in its final form along with associated written material will become available to all once final and it is highly recommended that this be a high-profile program at all ham-radio club meetings and other appropriate gatherings.

Jim N3BB

  At 06:46 AM 11/15/2019 -0500, Edward Sawyer wrote:
>I think that issue is that the discussion Jim had did not get to the 
>true root cause analysis in all cases.  HE did speak about temporary 
>guying below the work on  a tower and doing the "off the tower"
>movement of guys which clearly was a root cause of more than one known tower incident.
>
>I believe that a rusted base at the concrete exit point was a root 
>cause and I am not sure I heard that mentioned.
>
>W0AIH's fatality was in no way due to not using the proper safety 
>harness.  There are pictures of him using one.  I am not sure what 
>failed in his arrest system.  But wearing the wrong harness is not what it was.
>
>To be truthful to the root cause analysis process, of which I do a lot 
>if it at work, is there documented fatalities of wearing the lesser 
>harness than what Jim was showing on the video?  If so, what happened, 
>and how would it be mitigated by that ewquipment?
>
>If we REALLY want to improve safety, we should focus on what's killing 
>people.  Not on what isn't killing people.
>
>Some of that occurred on Jim's talk.  Some of it did not.  And some of 
>it is great advice but may have no direct impact on reducing what's 
>killing people.
>
>Ed  N1UR
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: CQ-Contest [mailto:cq-contest-bounces at contesting.com] On Behalf 
>Of rjairam at gmail.com
>Sent: Thursday, November 14, 2019 7:19 PM
>To: James Cain
>Cc: CQ-Contest Reflector
>Subject: Re: [CQ-Contest] Tower safety
>
>You got lucky.
>
>I prefer not to rely on luck, and it doesn’t take much time to get 
>properly suited up at all.
>
>As for replacing the climbing apparatus, I wouldn’t trust it if it 
>arrested a serious fall. Stress on that kind of apparatus is cumulative 
>so there may be hidden danger.
>
>This is your life you’re gambling with and by all means I won’t 
>tell you how to live it, but I prefer not to roll the dice.
>
>Ria
>N2RJ
>
>On Thu, Nov 14, 2019 at 3:22 PM James Cain <jamesdavidcain at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > I did pretty serious tower work for more than 20 years and quit at age 44.
> > By the time I had got suited up in that equipment in the K1IR video 
> > it would have been too dark to get any work done. And what's this 
> > about "If you fall, (the manufacturer says) to throw away the 
> > climbing
> apparatus"?
> > And what? Buy another climbing apparatus from us?
> >
> > K1TN
> > _______________________________________________
> > CQ-Contest mailing list
> > CQ-Contest at contesting.com
> > http://lists.contesting.com/mailman/listinfo/cq-contest
> >
>_______________________________________________
>CQ-Contest mailing list
>CQ-Contest at contesting.com
>http://lists.contesting.com/mailman/listinfo/cq-contest
>_______________________________________________ CQ-Contest mailing list 
>CQ-Contest at contesting.com 
>http://lists.contesting.com/mailman/listinfo/cq-contest