Sebastian Junger's climbing accident

Oxman

Oxman

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Sebastian Junger\'s climbing accident

Sebastian Junger, author of "The Perfect Storm", wrote about his climbing accident in a book about hazardous professions. The chapter on the perils of commercial fishing became the book & movie starring George Cloony.

He had an adventure with an out of control chainsaw, cutting his achilles tendon, which is described in this article in this Observer magazine profile.

Sebastian recently spent a year and a half in Afghanistan shooting his new movie, called "Restrepo".

Robert Oxman was stationed about a mile down the Korengal Valley while the documentary was filmed. The filmakers lived with the US Army soldiers stationed in this remote valley that connects eastern Afghanistan with Pakistan. National Geographic has the broadcast TV rights, and the theatrical release is scheduled for June.

Junger will be in Seattle next week promoting his new book, a true story of his involvement with a serial killer known as the "Boston Strangler".
 
Re: Sebastian Junger\'s climbing accident

Hey Ox, yeah Sebastion was a contract climber for many years when he first started writing.

I have a couple of old articles with stories about the peril of his climbing days. I'll see if I can find them and at least let people know which magazines they are from.

Thanks for the links.

By the way Sebastian's favorite pants to wear while on assignment are Arborwear.
 
Re: Sebastian Junger\'s climbing accident

read an article about him in Mens Journal last month, he was shown standing on a white pine stump in NH or VT, shirtless. The photo was from last month he said
 
Re: Sebastian Junger\'s climbing accident

I read the Men's Journal article in a waiting room, and have been watching the board here to see a post on the lack of PPE.

Tim
 
Re: Sebastian Junger\'s climbing accident

[ QUOTE ]
I read the Men's Journal article in a waiting room, and have been watching the board here to see a post on the lack of PPE.

Tim

[/ QUOTE ]

Hard to tell what he wore to do the tree, he was standing on a stump shirtless, with a saw.
 
Re: Sebastian Junger\'s climbing accident

[/ QUOTE ]
Hard to tell what he wore to do the tree, he was standing on a stump shirtless, with a saw.

[/ QUOTE ]

I agree Bull. You can't really know what he was wearing when he fell the tree.
 
Re: Sebastian Junger\'s climbing accident

I can not highly recommend his new book WAR to enough people. I picked it up Wednesday, started it Weds. night, and am almost done it already. I cant put it down! I find myself up till midnight reading fo r3-4 hours at a time. Great book and an awesome author!
 
Re: Sebastian Junger\'s climbing accident

Just found this thread. Alas, too late for the book signing. Thanks for all, Ox....

Give my regards to Robert when you can. I enjoyed rereading the NYT article about the firefight....

Work has picked up....and I've been filling hard drives with pics like crazy...thanks to two new SLR's.....
 
Re: Sebastian Junger\'s climbing accident

I read his book 'Fire'. It's a compilation of articles, damn good read. The guy has talent... pretty big set of huevos too.
 
Re: Sebastian Junger\'s climbing accident

Here’s a list of the articles that I have, that were written by Sebastian Junger and have appeared in some magazines over the years. Without a doubt, he’s one of the best authors out there today. If I can get my printer/scanner connection going with my laptop, I’ll try to post the articles.

“Out On A Limb” – Tales of Terror, and Exhilaration from the top of an 80 foot Maple
Appeared in This Old House magazine – Mar/Apr 1998
Excellent article about Sebastian’s and other tree climber’s experiences.

“Fear Itself” – Danger itself is often unavoidable. Sometimes the best way to prepare for
it is to let go of life.
Appeared in the Mar. 2007 issue of National Geographic Adventure magazine.
Great article that every tree worker can learn from. Nice picture of Sebastian
topping out a 100’ White Pine in New York.

“Running Away” – At some point in our civilized lives, we take a good look around and
decide we just want out. For Sebastian Junger, that frontier was within himself.
Appeared in the Dec 2007/Jan 2008 issue of National Geographic Adventure
magazine.
Very interesting article
 
Re: Sebastian Junger\'s climbing accident

Here's the article, "Fear Itself"

http://www.nationalgeographic.com/adventure/sebastian-junger/fear-sierra-leone.html

I found this paragraph put our situation nicely,

"I used to work as a climber for tree companies, and many times I've topped-out enormous white pines with 20 feet (6 meters) of tree above me and another 80 feet (24 meters) of tree below. In a situation like that, your safety depends on making just the right cut so that the top of the tree falls forward and away rather than back on top of you. Obviously it's a high-anxiety situation that you can really psyche yourself out for, and I've waited five, ten minutes before starting the chain saw to make a cut like that. I wasn't waiting for courage. I was waiting for emptiness."
 
Re: Sebastian Junger\'s climbing accident

No problem, I knew that I had the articles someplace.

"Out On A Limb" is an awesome article. When I first read it back in 1998, I didn't even know that Sebastian was a tree climber.

There are some good pictures that go along with the article too. He even talks about ISA Certification. Half of the problems he talks about are definitely avoidable with proper planning, but I'll leave that for another topic.
 
Re: Sebastian Junger\'s climbing accident

[ QUOTE ]
Obviously it's a high-anxiety situation that you can really psyche yourself out for, and I've waited five, ten minutes before starting the chain saw to make a cut like that. I wasn't waiting for courage. I was waiting for emptiness."

[/ QUOTE ]

Sounds like I'm in the minority here, but I've usually felt he is overdramatic in his writing, and the above might be a good example: do any of you guys know a good climber who would wait 5-10 minutes to get properly psyched before cutting out a 20' pine top?? Sounds like he shouldn't be up there cuz he lacks adequate knowledge or experience. He should set something up with the cut so it will be a no-brainer instead of something that sounds like it is life or death.

We've all waited for a lull in the wind, e.g., but 5 to ten minutes of waiting?? The ground crew musta been saying WTF, Seb is at it again, he'll probably write a big thing about this, but we'd just like to get the tree down and get home early...
 
Re: Sebastian Junger\'s climbing accident

Cory, what we have to understand is that Sebastian is not writing specifically to tree workers all the time and as any good writer, he is going to have a flare for the dramatic.

I read those articles with a sense of amusement knowing full well that it doesn’t take that long before making a cut. Maybe he would have been better off saying that it FELT like 5 to 10 minutes before making a cut?
 
Re: Sebastian Junger\'s climbing accident

LOL!

"he'll probably write a big thing about this, but we'd just like to get the tree down and get home early... "
 
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