A Teenage Tragedy

I would be lying if I told you otherwise and that is not who I am. After speaking with the labor of ministry investigator on the Oshawa fatality he confirmed this would have been life saving for the young man in that case. I haven’t spoke to the investigator on this weeks fatality. But I am sure it would have prevented this accident. The investigator in Michigan back in October last year said it would have prevented that fatality as well.

I want to promote awareness that there is a way to prevent this from
happening.
 
Reach said:
Morbark has that, I think they call it ChipSafe or something similar. Bandit may have something like it, but I’ve never seen it on one. You do have to wear magnets on your wrists and ankles for it to work though, so anyone not wearing those won’t trip the sensors.

It seems to me that someone running a chipper in a manner sufficiently unsafe to be pulled in is not likely to be wearing a safety device such as that, even if the chipper is equipped for it.
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Off topic slightly, but it would be cool if chippers could have built in metal detectors. Then crew would have to wear metal bands, but also help mitigate that random t post or bracing rod from going through the machine
 
evo said:
Off topic slightly, but it would be cool if chippers could have built in metal detectors. Then crew would have to wear metal bands, but also help mitigate that random t post or bracing rod from going through the machine
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That would be great, I’ve often thought that, but I’m not sure how well that would work unless you built the infeed out of plastic? If the infeed was steel, like they all are, it seems to me the chippers would either trip incessantly or never trip.
 
chieftreehugger said:
I would be lying if I told you otherwise and that is not who I am. After speaking with the labor of ministry investigator on the Oshawa fatality he confirmed this would have been life saving for the young man in that case. I haven’t spoke to the investigator on this weeks fatality. But I am sure it would have prevented this accident. The investigator in Michigan back in October last year said it would have prevented that fatality as well.

I want to promote awareness that there is a way to prevent this from
happening.
Click to expand...
You got to believe in somethin' . . . Why not believe in me? {The Pointer Sisters}
I've always thought that I'd be a real good spokesperson if I truly believed in the product; nothing wrong with that.
 
A chipper is as if a monster kept slave; forced to chew wood, while connives how to get the meat and blood it actually craves.
Anytime go near the thing, know that is what are dealing with !
See the monster, and know that this is no game.
.
Went to a local funeral of such an accident.
It was decades ago, but the unearthly wailing sound from the tree company owner made, hugging the 6yr old his wife of 7mos. left behind, still haunts and chills thru my soul; like freezing winter wind feels as cuts thru bones like an xray.
.
She was running the chipper, not very big girl; and he went to check on her(witnesses). He could not find her anywhere around the still running chipper backed into place across a trail of plywood, nor anywhere else around. The city had already been thru for the electric safety trim they were cleaning up, all in top order as would hope, high dollar location. Eventually he went behind the chipper again and looked up and had to figure out what the red gruel coming out the other end of the chipper was and started puking, screaming, throwing self on ground etc. He then disappeared; and had the cops looking for him.
.
2 buddies and i went and closed the job for him when the cops were done; (no charge of course)tho the tree was massive. Home Owners so freaked we only saw 2nd story drape move few times all day; we just cleared all and left. Porty's original T's were still new, i was still taking shit about carrying a bent boat anchor around; but really proved itself that day.
.
Talked to a city tree maintenance guy, seems the coroner sent the chipper to him to get more evidence. Seems he had been thru this before and not them... The man talked about all kind of nasties found stripping out chipper internals pre-court. It seemed he needed to get these undigestible images puked out of self as he talked as like therapy. Including how hard it is to get human gristle from the internal chipper drums etc.
before:
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TheTreeSpyder said:
A chipper is as if a monster kept slave; forced to chew wood, while connives how to get the meat and blood it actually craves.
Anytime go near the thing, know that is what are dealing with !
See the monster, and know that this is no game.
.
Went to a local funeral of such an accident.
It was decades ago, but the unearthly wailing sound from the tree company owner made, hugging the 6yr old his wife of 7mos. left behind, still haunts and chills thru my soul; like freezing winter wind feels as cuts thru bones like an xray.
.
She was running the chipper, not very big girl; and he went to check on her(witnesses). He could not find her anywhere around the still running chipper backed into place across a trail of plywood, nor anywhere else around. The city had already been thru for the electric safety trim they were cleaning up, all in top order as would hope, high dollar location. Eventually he went behind the chipper again and looked up and had to figure out what the red gruel coming out the other end of the chipper was and started puking, screaming, throwing self on ground etc. He then disappeared; and had the cops looking for him.
.
2 buddies and i went and closed the job for him when the cops were done; (no charge of course)tho the tree was massive. Home Owners so freaked we only saw 2nd story drape move few times all day; we just cleared all and left. Porty's original T's were still new, i was still taking shit about carrying a bent boat anchor around; but really proved itself that day.
.
Talked to a city tree maintenance guy, seems the coroner sent the chipper to him to get more evidence. Seems he had been thru this before and not them... The man talked about all kind of nasties found stripping out chipper internals pre-court. It seemed he needed to get these undigestible images puked out of self as he talked as like therapy. Including how hard it is to get human gristle from the internal chipper drums etc.
Click to expand...
This is the most sobering, and even poetic, account of a chipper accident I have ever read or want to read. The imagery is too powerful. So much so, that I am unable to concentrate on anything else now. This post should be required reading for anyone who goes near a chipper, except the reading needs to be done after the technical lessons on the rules of chipper safety so they can concentrate on that first. If the lessons are effective, the only way we will know it is if nothing bad happened today. I am learning to celebrate those boring, nothing-bad-happened days.
 
misfit said:
This is the most sobering, and even poetic, account of a chipper accident I have ever read or want to read. The imagery is too powerful. So much so, that I am unable to concentrate on anything else now. This post should be required reading for anyone who goes near a chipper, except the reading needs to be done after the technical lessons on the rules of chipper safety so they can concentrate on that first. If the lessons are effective, the only way we will know it is if nothing bad happened today. I am learning to celebrate those boring, nothing-bad-happened days.
Click to expand...
We say every day in our safety brief, “Let’s have another boring day of tree work.”
 
The other haunting local nightmare i didn't have to be there to feel the chills is a tale of 3brothers, 1 of the remaining told the story. All worked together as a well known local tree service bearing the family name.
.
This man told a story of his brother he had always known, even sharing the same room for half their lives; flinging up into the air out of bucket, not tied in to then crashing to the ground 10' in front of him head first. The story became instantly even more ghastly with vivid slow motion description of head cracking open, eyes popping out towards him as body continued like freight train crashing into ground as body seemed to melt/liquefy until hit hips. You know like you hear about man sticking leg into chipper throat and it grabs him and can only chew to pelvis typically if smaller 6" throat, wondering if victim would rather just be done thru a much larger industrial model....
.
They had been rigging off the bucket to ground control as bucket man cut load for years. This one hit hard, they were rushing confidently. The load impact 2/1 against bucket pulling it down hard until rope finally broke, the bucket recoiled upwards sharply; exporting anything or anyone not attached.
.
Serious incident,
Serious errs,
Serious tragedy.
Yes, another boring day of hard azz tree work, does sound best, ty!
 
Reach said:
I grew up driving big tractors down the road at 14, because farm rules in PA said I could. I also started my first lawn service at 14, which OSHA probably would not have liked.
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OSHA rules only relate to employees. If you run your own company they allow you to kill yourself unmolested by bureaucratic red tape.
 
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