Bartlett Fail

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swingdude said:
Why not wait till proper conditions....I get a shitload of wind here...I call jobs off and return when shit is right..that there is unecessary....also I seen them lombardy's when I was in the UK...that was a climb and piece out job...too many things to fuck up plus as guys are saying shity hingewood properties
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Aaaaand.......you have experience and common sense. Don't assume all " tree men" do.
 
amazing that they had so little control of the potential DZ.. There is just no excuse for that. Every single person on that crew should be fired for that alone. even with a guy line, per Ryan's suggestion, which would have made it near 100% certain to make the intended lay (if you can set one line you can set two!) you could then chance the cars, BUT YOU WOULD NEVER CHANCE a pedestrian. You would have had to close off sidewalks in both directions.. Even if the tree went the right way, failure to close that sidewalk in completely unacceptable..

Hard to say exactly how the event unfolded, but as was stated earlier almost certain that the hinge was cut up too far.. direction of pull was slightly off which is no big deal with a good hinging species but a disaster waiting to happen in lombady or tulip... More importantly it looks like the crew just isn;t familiar with using vehicles to pull trees over ... based on the straightness of the stick and the way it was moving in the wind, and is failure to move forward before the truck moves, its pretty clear thet did not use a lot of pretension... I would have put somewhere north of 1,000 lbs of pretension on that line which would have bowed that top forward noticeably... fat fricking 4" + tapered hinge and hit the gas... still no guarentees with lombardy, but pretty good chances of making it work.. using a guy line and redirect to get the direction of pull correct would be using everything you have to out the odds in your favor.... If you listen closely you can hear the tap tap tap of a wedge being driven in the first few seconds.. my guess is they dont train their people to pull with vehicles in England.. COme to think of ot they don;t train them to do tha in the USA either do they????

gotta wonder what went through that pedestrian's mind... can you imagine the dinner convewrsation when his wife asks him "how was your day honey?"
 
swingdude said:
He cut part of the hinge out...the piece left turned it on the stump...90 degrees there about....that left piece of hinge was the culprit
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I made that mistake a long time ago...hinge broke, tree twisted no pull rope. Broke metal roof, rafters, collar ties, soffit, racked the top plate about 1/2", neighbors trust and my confidence. I learned a lot that day. My carpentry skills improved quickly. Pro bono from start to finish.
 
Daniel said:
amazing that they had so little control of the potential DZ.. There is just no excuse for that. Every single person on that crew should be fired for that alone. even with a guy line, per Ryan's suggestion, which would have made it near 100% certain to make the intended lay (if you can set one line you can set two!) you could then chance the cars, BUT YOU WOULD NEVER CHANCE a pedestrian. You would have had to close off sidewalks in both directions.. Even if the tree went the right way, failure to close that sidewalk in completely unacceptable..

Hard to say exactly how the event unfolded, but as was stated earlier almost certain that the hinge was cut up too far.. direction of pull was slightly off which is no big deal with a good hinging species but a disaster waiting to happen in lombady or tulip... More importantly it looks like the crew just isn;t familiar with using vehicles to pull trees over ... based on the straightness of the stick and the way it was moving in the wind, and is failure to move forward before the truck moves, its pretty clear thet did not use a lot of pretension... I would have put somewhere north of 1,000 lbs of pretension on that line which would have bowed that top forward noticeably... fat fricking 4" + tapered hinge and hit the gas... still no guarentees with lombardy, but pretty good chances of making it work.. using a guy line and redirect to get the direction of pull correct would be using everything you have to out the odds in your favor.... If you listen closely you can hear the tap tap tap of a wedge being driven in the first few seconds.. my guess is they dont train their people to pull with vehicles in England.. COme to think of ot they don;t train them to do tha in the USA either do they????

gotta wonder what went through that pedestrian's mind... can you imagine the dinner convewrsation when his wife asks him "how was your day honey?"
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You bring up many valid points.


It's against Bartlett policy to use a vehicle or machine to pull a tree over. That's not to say that it doesn't get done. When I worked there, we used a Boxer with a branch manager a lot, with no ill results.
 
Does no one else notice the biggest problem here? They couldn't even tie a knot!!! As soon as the truck started to pull the line went slack = knot came undone. This is a prime example of having underpaid workers trying to tackle relatively easy tasks
 
pctree said:
Does no one else notice the biggest problem here? They couldn't even tie a knot!!! As soon as the truck started to pull the line went slack = knot came undone. This is a prime example of having underpaid workers trying to tackle relatively easy tasks
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I disagree. I believe the line went slack because the tree went opposite the direction of pull.
 
ROYCE said:
I disagree. I believe the line went slack because the tree went opposite the direction of pull.
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Wouldn't 'opposite' make the line get tighter?

It went sideways to the pull from what I saw. May even have swung a small arc.

I don't pull with a vehicle often but when I do I like to have a 'spotter' standing near the drivers door that can see the sawer and relay instant messages between the sawer and driver. I've often been the spotter and had I been the spotter on site in this mishap maybe could have prevent the accident. Of course there were other things going on at the site that I would not have stood for.

The rope went slack while the tree stood there wobbling. Had the driver only moved 10 or 20 feet forward there would have been no mishap. A spotter in his ear could have made the difference.
 
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It appears the line went slack an instant before the tree started to move, or move significantly.

Tree definitely went sideways relative to the pull direction, therefore very little impact on the amount of rope slack.

Something happened to the rope or the attachment point.
 
GregManning said:
It appears the line went slack an instant before the tree started to move, or move significantly.

Tree definitely went sideways relative to the pull direction, therefore very little impact on the amount of rope slack.

Something happened to the rope or the attachment point.
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Just my opinion of course but it looks to me like the tree moved towards the pull vehicle a slight bit giving in to the pull and rope stretch. It wasn't enough and with the truck not moving any further forwards the tree fell the way it was weighted. Looks like not enough hinge was left but Lombardy poplar may not have strong hinge wood.
 
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