Logging Safety

BACKGROUND: A logger was cleaning out vines that had accumulated in the feed rollers of a field chipper. He had correctly locked out the top feeder roll in an open position before he began his clean up. It was mid-afternoon of a hot summer day in the South. PERSONAL...

BACKGROUND: Contract thinning crew members moved a delimbing machine from a log deck to a public road to await transport to the next logging job. The machine had been moved before the knuckleboom loader operator had cleaned it. It was late on a winter afternoon in the...

BACKGROUND: On a cold (25 degrees F) winter morning in the Appalachians, a cable skidder operator was unchoking his load of pine under an electrical line 28 feet overhead. The landing had been in use in this location for three months, with no prior accidents. PERSONAL...

BACKGROUND: Burning piled slash in the fall and spring is a standard silvicultural practice in the Northwest. One method of burning involves hand lighting slash piles. On a warm fall day at an Inland West location, a forester had ridden an all-terrain-vehicle to an...

BACKGROUND: A crawler tractor operator was skidding logs in steep mountainous terrain on a clear autumn day in the southern Appalachians. PERSONAL CHARACTERISTICS: The 42-year-old employee had worked for his present employer about 15 years and had no previous record...

BACKGROUND: A municipal worker in the Lake States was part of a crew harvesting five acres of forest to provide space for a new city park. It was winter, but there were no adverse weather conditions. PERSONAL: The crew member was fifty-six years old and had worked for...