bucket harness

[Mangoes]

An effort should be made to define the type of fall protection system required:
-fall arrest
-fall restrict/work positioning

I have been told that the 'big orange' uses the belts with a short lanyard to 'eliminate' ejection from the platform. Kinda makes sense.

But if you are going to get ejected, you will sustain a fall, and WILL require fall arrest, which WILL require an energy absorbing lanyard. Or you'll break you back.

I don't fly a bucket and hold no preference, nor do I acurately know how reliable a short lanyard is for restricting ejection. If it doesnt make sense, than machismo and general defiance of the rules are simply symptoms of natural selection.

 

[Riggs]

I've been flying a bucket since I was a kid . Those old Asplundh cable buckets were scary. The waist belt with the short lanyard was terrible. I tried the same saddle for both deals and it doesn't work well for me. The full body harness is so light , if I am riding up a crane , I just wear it over my other belt and undo it when I role out of the bucket. I've had to bail out of a few buckets in my day and if I had a waist belt , I'd still be in that bucket. I had the check valve fail, front outrigger on a Skyworker and tipped the truck into a crotch about 60 feet up, had my saddle on ,no body harness (wasn't my truck) it was a crane job and I clipped into the ball and bailed . Once , the
upper boom down about by the knuckle was pressing on a stub, I gave it a little, trying to get off and shook me like ball on a paddle. I was bounced around for a bit and I think the short lanyard would have hurt me , I had the full body harness on , and it was as close to being ejected without being ejected. The new buckets , if the bucket were to rip off , you'd be hanging with a bunch of hoses , the old buckets you'd be laying on the floor ,when I was in them Skyworkers and Asplundh buckets ,I'd be tied into the upperboom. Besides the harness you wear , a short rope in the bottom of the bucket can get you out of a jam , better to have than to have not.

 

[Colin]

I clip in to the upper boom, for sure.