Night Work

[Mark Chisholm]

How cool is this rope?
Glow Rope

 

[Tom Dunlap]

If it glowed pink, I'd be using it

 

[tod_k]

We have in the past worked in the dark removing hazards. I feel and so does the owner that it is not worth it. Too much exposure. It has been a few years since I had a headlamp on.

 

[Mark Chisholm]

I can see this being great in rescue, especially for finding your way out of a smoky house or building. I know that they use it for caving too.

I would see this as being a good safety measure for an escape line when camping in the trees. Easy to clip onto the right line in an emergency.

 

[Oxman]

We did a night job for a month, consisting of all the palm trees on Wilshire Boulevard in the city of Beverly Hills. This is a commercial area, with lots of traffic during the daytime. It was made much simpler by waiting until the vehicles were gone. There was an eerie, desolate mood in the mostly abandoned town. The rich folks had gone back to their mansions in the residential neighborhoods, like vampires to their crypts.

These were Washingtonia robusta, or, Mexican Fan Palms. We were skinning the dead fronds to lessen the debris floating around this upscale neighborhood.

Although the job began at 11 at night and lasted until 5 in the morning, there was plenty of ambient light from street lights and the business district. Or, at least what we considered was enough. This was back in the 1970's, when things were a little looser.

Our crew started on the Los Angeles side of town, and worked all the trees on the north side of the street until we got to the Santa Monica city limits, in about two weeks. Then we crossed the street and trimmed our way eastward, back to the starting point.

I suppose this cycle is repeated every 5 years, or so. This bunch of trees is probably quite a bit taller, now. Kind of nice to have a naturally recurring work cycle.

Sometime I'll write about my experience with night pruning Ficus Benjamina in the mall, after hours.