Fall protection devices
I must comment on the cover of the May issue of SAM. With the current sensitivity to OSHA and, specifically, fall protection devices, I was amazed to see our industry’s most respected publication showing a worker in such a position without any form of fall protection device.
Our industry has had a number of violations cited by OSHA inspectors in the last year, and a number of allegations that ski area operators don’t take adequate precautions to assure the safety of the employees.
Currently our industry is working with OSHA to have the regulations requiring climbing devices on tower ladders better fit our application. This photo is not indicative of the efforts being made to comply with OSHA regulations and provide a safe work place for all ski area employees. I hope it isn’t seen by someone who might negatively impact the process.
— John Mauch, Lift Manager,
Breckenridge, Colo.
The above letter runs here in Speak-Out, the better to allow the safety-conscious rigger/author, Bob Diener, to air his opinions below. Yes, SAM’s editor was seduced by the inherent strength of the cover photo, and reader Mauch is quite right: we set a bad example. We apologize. But photographs can also be deceiving: the photographer successfully created the illusion that Jackson Hole’s Steve Barker was high up in the rigging — “illusion” because he was actually a scant 10 feet off the ground.
Dear John:
I have verified the fact that each employee of the Jackson Hole Ski Corp who works high does, in fact, have his own OSHA-approved fall harness. Many of these people choose to wear them under the coveralls because they fit better there, and still have access to their pockets; and they prove to be less hazardous by confining, under the coveralls, the many places that can snag as the workmen move about.
Each employee is also equipped with a quality safety belt. This equipment is routinely used, as other photographs in the story demonstrate.
These good men at Jackson Hole are well known to me. I know they are safety conscious. They recognize the hazards inherent in their high-risk jobs. They, especially Terry Zakotnik and cover subject Steve Barker, are competent, reasonable men in good physical condition and men with confidence in themselves. Steve has no intention of becoming a bungee jumper.
To me — and I’ve climbed many a tower — the ingredients of safety are, and in this order: common sense, ability to recognize and evaluate hazards, self-confidence, physical strength, no grandstanding or foolhardiness. Proper equipment remains under the heading of “common sense.” Last, but not least, is experience. It is not everyone’s, since we all had to start someplace, but if you lack the other qualifications you will probably not get experience anyway.
I view OSHA as a much-needed agency in this industrialized country, but, like many good-oriented groups, they tend to over-react. Given the qualifications set forth above, there remains about a .005 percent chance that fall-arresting gear would ever do any good, but we see OSHA devoting 80 percent of their efforts (a guess, of course) to these highly improbable scenarios.
One day, long ago, I climbed the tram car hanger frame ladder on the Jackson Hole Tramway. There was this 8-ton wire strand strung up the center of the ladder. Now, I wear a size 12 boot, but a size 12 in an insulated snow pack is w-i-d-e! I found myself looking down to place my feet beside that “safety” cable when I should have been looking up at my hand hold and to make sure I wouldn’t ram my head into whatever was there. I asked, “What the hell is this all about?” The answer came in a single word, “OSHA.” The “safety” line is still in place — an OSHA requirement.
I am 71 years of age, still climbing the towers. My wife is 63 (oops!) and still climbs, We both use sensible safety belts and we use common sense. Otherwise we just might not have survived the pre-OSHA years or the current OSHA regulations.
No, Jon, I would not be concerned with the safety of the man on the cover. He knows what he is about. He enjoys what he does, so let’s not belabor his happy state of mind by forcing him to “live by the book.” Every item you carry “up” carries with it its own amount of hazard and its own liability to the workman. If we asked him to wear a fall harness in this situation he would probably quit the job he loves to become a Volkswagen mechanic. We need him there, just like he is!
— Bob Diener
To which SAM, having given Bob Diener his colorful say, adds that “living by the book” is always a pain, but ultimately may be less painful than the heavy-duty OSHA fines imposed after an accident or as a result of a complaint by a disgruntled employee. And, as Jon Mauch indicates, relief from specific OSHA requirements, while extremely difficult, can be negotiated, as ASF has recently demonstrated.
