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Joined: Jan 2002
Posts: 10,612 Likes: 1
Campfire Outfitter
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Campfire Outfitter
Joined: Jan 2002
Posts: 10,612 Likes: 1 |
My father at 82, foolishly, was cutting a large tree branch while 10 feet up on a ladder with a chainsaw. He fell and it destroyed his life, 3 months in a coma followed by brain damage and Alzheimer’s. Before this he was in great shape both physically and mentally. If your not young don’t do something like this. Better to have a younger guy do it for you.
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Joined: Jan 2018
Posts: 23,506
Campfire Ranger
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Campfire Ranger
Joined: Jan 2018
Posts: 23,506 |
Hope you are ok. Been there done that. It sucks. I'm fine. Just going to be really sore and stiff. Glad you’re ok...Step ladders are potentially hazardous to one’s health. Come to think of it, so are extension ladders. I’ve falling once, from both. It hurt! 😎
Curiosity Killed the Cat & The Prairie Dog “Molon Labe”
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Joined: Jan 2002
Posts: 10,612 Likes: 1
Campfire Outfitter
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Campfire Outfitter
Joined: Jan 2002
Posts: 10,612 Likes: 1 |
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Joined: Aug 2007
Posts: 115,424 Likes: 13
Campfire Sage
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Campfire Sage
Joined: Aug 2007
Posts: 115,424 Likes: 13 |
Hope you are ok. Been there done that. It sucks. I'm fine. Just going to be really sore and stiff. Glad you’re ok...Step ladders are potentially hazardous to one’s health. Come to think of it, so are extension ladders. I’ve falling once, from both. It hurt! 😎 Perhaps concussion is the reason you all stay in Oregon.
Trump being classless,tasteless and clueless as usual. Sorry, trump is a no tax payin pile of shiit. My young wife decided to play the field and had moved several dudes into my house
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Joined: Jan 2018
Posts: 23,506
Campfire Ranger
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Campfire Ranger
Joined: Jan 2018
Posts: 23,506 |
Hope you are ok. Been there done that. It sucks. I'm fine. Just going to be really sore and stiff. Glad you’re ok...Step ladders are potentially hazardous to one’s health. Come to think of it, so are extension ladders. I’ve falling once, from both. It hurt! 😎 Perhaps concussion is the reason you all stay in Oregon. We’re working on getting out, and we will. 😎
Curiosity Killed the Cat & The Prairie Dog “Molon Labe”
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Joined: Jul 2006
Posts: 8,551
Campfire Outfitter
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Campfire Outfitter
Joined: Jul 2006
Posts: 8,551 |
...Hurts a lot more when you're 60 than when you're 16. Happened to my dad when he was about 67. Landed on his side and knocked the wind out of him, but no broken ribs or bones. He was sore for a spell afterwards.
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Joined: Oct 2006
Posts: 4,237
Campfire Tracker
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Campfire Tracker
Joined: Oct 2006
Posts: 4,237 |
the wife won't let me on a ladder anymore. she has a builtin radar so that all i have to do is pick one up hundreds of feet away and she appears with that look on her face. My bride is the same, DS. She even gives me "the look" when I drag out the 2-step stool to change a light bulb in a fixture in an 8 ft ceiling . . . Used to do that standing on the floor - just can't stretch that high anymore. Did lots of roofing and painting with old wooden extension ladders years ago, but not these days.
Someday I hope to be the person my dogs think I am . . . The only true cost of having a dog is its death. Someone once said "a nation of sheep will beget a government of wolves." Shiloh Sharps . . . there is no substitute. NRA Endowment Member
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Joined: Aug 2007
Posts: 19,496
Campfire Ranger
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Campfire Ranger
Joined: Aug 2007
Posts: 19,496 |
...Hurts a lot more when you're 60 than when you're 16. Sure does. And much more likely to break something.
Retired cat herder.
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Joined: Jun 2020
Posts: 9,450
Campfire Outfitter
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Campfire Outfitter
Joined: Jun 2020
Posts: 9,450 |
My father at 82, foolishly, was cutting a large tree branch while 10 feet up on a ladder with a chainsaw. He fell and it destroyed his life, 3 months in a coma followed by brain damage and Alzheimer’s. Before this he was in great shape both physically and mentally. If your not young don’t do something like this. Better to have a younger guy do it for you. Oh man, I am so sorry to hear that! I used to worry and get on my Dad for getting on ladders when he was on a blood thinner. They want to be so independent at that age. I'm not very old, but not nearly as young as I used to be. My friends spent half an hour or more trying to talk me out of it. They said, call the young guys at church and ask them, etc. LOL! IF I could find a few young dudes so motivated, I would be putting them at greater risk because they would not have the experience needed from small, more skill developing jobs. Somebody's bound to get hurt. I can't afford the tens of thousands that an arborist would charge either. After thinking it through, My last resort is to pace myself, prestretches, supplement, and continue with the smaller tops...then work my way up to the large 25-30% off of the biggest ones. I'm just outta shape from my spring injury and sedentary winter. I will take your unfortunate Dad's experience to heart and take care to use a double safety harness, tree lash points, helmet....and pray. Thanks.
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Joined: Nov 2006
Posts: 3,758
Campfire Tracker
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Campfire Tracker
Joined: Nov 2006
Posts: 3,758 |
I've been repainting the soffit, fascia and trim on my house on my days off for the last week or so. 10 to 20 feet. Lots of uneven ground and frequent ladder moves. I swear I've spent as much time setting up the ladders properly as I've spent on them. Time well spent.
I slipped off some wet wooden steps screwed into a tree one time while hunting. Herniated a lumbar disc which required surgery and fractured three thoracic vertebrae. That one hurt.
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Joined: Aug 2012
Posts: 5,506 Likes: 2
Campfire Tracker
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Campfire Tracker
Joined: Aug 2012
Posts: 5,506 Likes: 2 |
I stay off of them if at all possible. I have had a few friends who fell off and got seriously injured. Both too old to fully recover. Hitting ground isnt worst of it is getting tangled up in the ladder and busted up.
Life can be rough on us dreamers.
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Joined: May 2001
Posts: 18,350 Likes: 2
Campfire Ranger
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OP
Campfire Ranger
Joined: May 2001
Posts: 18,350 Likes: 2 |
Pretty sore this morning. Doubt I'll be up on the ladder today.
Carpe' Scrotum
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Joined: Jan 2006
Posts: 69,486 Likes: 18
Campfire Kahuna
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Campfire Kahuna
Joined: Jan 2006
Posts: 69,486 Likes: 18 |
I spend a fair amount of time up a 12' orchard ladder. They look spooky but they're actually quite stable with the wide set legs. As long as you're careful to set the pole, you're on a wide spread tripod.
“In a time of deceit telling the truth is a revolutionary act.” ― George Orwell
It's not over when you lose. It's over when you quit.
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Joined: Aug 2007
Posts: 19,496
Campfire Ranger
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Campfire Ranger
Joined: Aug 2007
Posts: 19,496 |
My local friendly doc and I were visiting one day and discussing peoples' thinking and behavior. He has a very bright neighbor, Ph.D. and engineer type, who simply doesn't have a lick of common sense. One day he put a ladder up and leaned it on a branch of a tree he was going to cut off, and, just like a cartoon, cut it off between the ladder and the trunk.
Retired cat herder.
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Joined: Jan 2010
Posts: 23,578 Likes: 2
Campfire Ranger
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Campfire Ranger
Joined: Jan 2010
Posts: 23,578 Likes: 2 |
I give ladders alot of respect.
maybe 2 years ago I was fixing a gutter due to ice build up, climbed down and my foot slid off the rung. I fell off the ladder, rolled off the deck and broke a guard rail. It hurt like hell but the guard rail slowed me down, plus I had a heavy coat and I landed on the square of my shoulders.
I was lucky I didn't get seriously hurt. But it was the reminder that I'm not a kid anymore.
Last edited by KFWA; 07/13/20.
have you paid your dues, can you moan the blues, can you bend them guitar strings
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Joined: Dec 2002
Posts: 14,293 Likes: 5
Campfire Outfitter
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Campfire Outfitter
Joined: Dec 2002
Posts: 14,293 Likes: 5 |
Having built the log cabin, I was building the porch on the left. I had the 6x6 posts and beam set up on the outside of the porch. The rafters are 14 foot 4x8, white pine. The high part of the roof is 12 feet above the floor. I had set up a 10 foot extension ladder leaning up against the log wall. I set the big pine timber on top of the beam, and I was carrying the 4x8 on my shoulder. I was going to carry it up the ladder, and install it with some 3 1/2 inch decking screws. I climbed up the ladder with the big timber on my shoulder, and the DeWalt cordless drill, the screw gun, in my right hand. I set the 4x8 against the top log, and ran the screw in with the drill. At that instant the ladder kicked out. I had some fast reflexes because I grabbed that beam with my right arm. I dropped the drill and was swinging there, 5 feet above the deck, hanging by my right arm, just wrapped my arm around that timber. I wondered if a single 3 1/2 inch screw could hold my weight. Five feet is not far to fall, but I wanted to make sure that ladder got settled before I dropped, if my leg got tangled up in those rungs could have been hurt badly. I hung there for a minute or two, waited for the aluminum ladder to get settled, and then dropped down onto the floor, no injury. After that, when I set the ladder, I laid down a 10 foot 2x4 on the wooden deck and screwed it in with 2 of the big screws, to hold the ladder in place. I got real serious about secure ladder placement after this incident.
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Joined: Sep 2017
Posts: 2,795
Campfire Regular
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Campfire Regular
Joined: Sep 2017
Posts: 2,795 |
Time and materials to tie in a ladder is never a waste, it is part of the job.
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Joined: Sep 2009
Posts: 11,322 Likes: 9
Campfire Outfitter
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Campfire Outfitter
Joined: Sep 2009
Posts: 11,322 Likes: 9 |
I fell about 26 feet several years ago. I got lucky and all I broke was my nose. I dislocated my shoulder and left foot pretty bad. I busted my head open above my left eyebrow and busted my lip all the way through. I fell on relatively soft ground, which certainly helped quite a bit. I was pretty roughed up and sore as hell for the next several days, but I was darn lucky that I wasn't hurt a lot worse. I wont be getting up there again unless I scaffold it all the way up.
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Joined: Aug 2003
Posts: 10,262
Campfire Outfitter
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Campfire Outfitter
Joined: Aug 2003
Posts: 10,262 |
I was thrown from a Horse with my foot caught in the stirrup for about 2 jumps of the horse . my right side was black and blue from my knee to my arm pit for 2 months but I was ok...my closest call.
Last edited by Hubert; 07/13/20.
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Joined: Jan 2006
Posts: 69,486 Likes: 18
Campfire Kahuna
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Campfire Kahuna
Joined: Jan 2006
Posts: 69,486 Likes: 18 |
I worked for a roofing company for a while. We were required to tie off all ladders. However, on most houses, there's nothing to tie to. I've seen ropes tied to rain gutters and about everything else. Most tieoffs won't help a bit to prevent a fall. What it mainly accomplishes is keeping the ladder from sliding off the roof and leaving you stranded up there.
“In a time of deceit telling the truth is a revolutionary act.” ― George Orwell
It's not over when you lose. It's over when you quit.
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