Accident report in October TCI Mag.

Mowerr

Mowerr

Branched out member
Location
Ny
I just read the report and one of them in particular is bothering me a lot.
The accident happend on August 8,2019 in happy valley, Oregon.
In short 2 climbers were tied into a compact lift to take down a shade installation at a music festival. The boom was positioned on an incline and the lift tipped over sending the 2 men to the ground with considerable force resulting in the deaths of these 2 climbers.
First it seems weird they were only tied into a lift on a hill that wasn't stabilized right and or I feel the lift should have had a redundant anchor system to help stabilize and prevent a tip over.
I also feel when working at a venue like that theres certain regulations that must be followed to be compliant, more similar to the rope access industry than ours.
Maybe the accident was reported incorrectly and we don't have any facts straight but does this one stick out to anybody who read this months issue?
 
Copy and pasted from an article. There’s another article that says they were in the lift when it fell, other articles say the ascended on the lift and climbed out, into a tree, while staying tied to the boom?


HAPPY VALLEY, OR (CelebrityAccess) — Two workers were fatally injured in an accident during the teardown of the Pickathon Music festival at Pendarvis Farm in Happy Valley, Oregon.

According to the Willamatte Week, the two workers, arborists with GuildWorks, a Portland-based company that specializes in temporary structures and tents, were killed when a boom lift tipped over.

“There were two people in the basket at the time the cherry picker tipped over,” Capt. Brandon Paxton of Clackamas Fire told Willamatte Week. “Tragically, both people were killed.”

“The arborists had been ascending in a boom lift before climbing further up trees to get to ropes holding up the complex shade installation,” the Sheriff’s Office said in a statement. “They were wearing safety equipment and were roped to the boom lift, which was reportedly positioned on an incline.”

In a statement on Friday, a spokesperson for the festival expressed its dismay at the accident and offered condolences to the families of the two workers.

“We are shocked and deeply saddened by the tragic loss of two members of the GuildWorks crew during breakdown of this year’s festival. Please join us in offering up prayers and support to their families and friends during this difficult time. All involved in Pickathon are like members of a family to us. We will wrap our collective arms around all affected and share in the grieving process. Please stay connected to Pickathon as we work to provide support to the families,” the statement said.

Now in its 20th year, Pickathon, which featured Phil Lesh & Friends, Nathaniel Rateliff, Lucius, Mandolin Orange, Khurangbin, and the Preservation Hall Jazz Band among numerous others, took place from August 2nd through 4th.



There’s a pic of the telescoping boom lift, a rented Genie S-85.
They climbed off the platform into a tree and stayed tied to the lift basket.
Do you think they had counterweight setup correctly to ascend and work from the platform then things went wrong once the extended boom platform lost the 2 men’s body weight when they climbed out?
I honestly don’t know but it could explain why it tilted and why they didn’t have time to react to the tilt alarm. Just a theory, probably never know for sure unless we learn the investigation findings.
The boom in the pic isn’t extended very much.


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Very sad. Thanks for posting it @Mowerr . Might give some food for thought to someone here that might rent a different type lift than they’re used to.
 
Armchair quarterback observations.

I spent about 3 years using a 65' tele lift without the articulating stinger on the top. It was a very stable machine in my experience

It looks like the lift went over 'backwards'. The counter weight is on the ground...the lift isn't extended in an attention-getting angle...the boom isn't extended only rotated.

These lifts are meant to be driven with the boom extended. When I first started running mine I spent time in a flat, empty parking lot doing some test drives. The controls would over-ride driving sometimes. In the position shown in the pic I don't ever recall being one bit wobbly.

Big question...why did if go over 'backwards'? the ground looks level and not muddy.

Let's hope that the results of the investigation are made public.
 
From memory reading about the events there was an increase in wind and they were on an incline. Vaguely remember reading there was a wind gust.
 
my thinking, for what it’s worth, is that the lift was positioned sideways on the slope, where the wheel base is narrower than it is long, and the counterweight was on the downhill side. That potentially makes the counterweight “heavier“ then it would be if it was sitting on flat ground. Perhaps when they left the basket, the loss of their weight, so far out on the boom, was enough to underweight the basket sufficiently to cause the lift to tip over backwards. Our crane service had something similar happened years ago, at his shop - an operator picked up the boom and swung sideways without the outriggers down, and the crane tipped over onto the counterweight side.
 
Do all you guys tie into buckets and work off that tip???
Am I the only one who thinks that isn't a good idea?
My biggest question was, is tying into a bucket standard practice for anybody in ours or other rope access work At height?
I've never heard of it...I never seen it, Even when climbing out of the bucket to get higher into a tree.
 
Whatever the case, the only way I could envision their climbing system was a canopy or base tie into the machine and then they climbed out of the bucket to go higher into the tree (if that detail was correct) probably using natural redirects (doesn't matter natural or not)
No way for us to know unless we could see a picture of the layout of land or a picture of the shade installation...
 
Mowerr said:
Do all you guys tie into buckets and work off that tip???
Am I the only one who thinks that isn't a good idea?
My biggest question was, is tying into a bucket standard practice for anybody in ours or other rope access work At height?
I've never heard of it...I never seen it, Even when climbing out of the bucket to get higher into a tree.
Click to expand...

We have to be tied in to the bucket when getting out, until tied into tree when we can untie from the bucket.
 
Chaplain242 said:
We have to be tied in to the bucket when getting out, until tied into tree when we can untie from the bucket.
Click to expand...
Alright that makes sense...
Whenever I did it or seen it done, we just boomed up then tossed our climb line and/or lanyard somewhere above us to the tree and tied into the tree before leaving the bucket.
 
Some trees just easier to get out and climb up or out to set a tip, that’s the only time really need to have two climbing systems getting out of bucket. Don’t really need to do it often...
 
I guess the biggest no no I've done with a bucket truck's usin it like a crane from the lower control panel, to get brush over a school fence, in little 250 lb bundles.

Exactly what kinda bucket/lift are we talkin, articulating, scissored, tele?

Jemco
 
That kinda lift's weakest point off to either side, which is the configuration the pic shows it hit the ground in.

Pretty sure it's meant to be used off the front, not the side.....

Jemco
 
The one I ran could be operated to the side. In fcat, ta sixty five feet extension I could put the basket about five feet below level...and drive too. There were all sorts of controls that wouldn't allow me to go into setups that a were wrong.

It was amazing where I could drive with the boom up and out. Especially with no extension like in the pic.

But...like what's been suggested...two climbers getting out of the platform would have changed the loads and might have caused a springboard.
 
True no doubt, on level ground, bu not on an incline.

You'll never see them in the rental yards retracted or extended anywhere but straight ahead in its most stable and wind resistant configuration.

Jemco
 
Heck, even articulating modern bucket trucks with outriggers, made for arborists, are sorely limited on how much incline they can take without stripping out their rotation gears.

True cranes even more so.

Jemco
 
As is too often the case, there is not enough information and too few photographs.
I have been through dozens or hundreds of “safety stand downs” that have done very little to bolster awareness, because the details are insufficient to clearly illustrate what occurred.

Poor or incomplete accident reports do a disservice to everyone by causing speculation and muddying the waters unnecessarily.

I’m sorry this happened.
I’m sorry those people died.
 
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