The time has come, the walrus said,

On Mar 23, 9:07*am, Myron Buck wrote:
On Mar 22, 9:02*am, "dr.narcolepsy" wrote:





On Mar 21, 8:45*pm, Bob wrote:

On Mar 19, 4:29*am, Giles wrote:

On Mar 19, 3:12*am, Bob wrote:

Actually the type of accident you describe (here in big timber country
we call it a barber chair) is *one of the most common causes of death
or serious injury in timber falling accidents.

Never heard the term "barber chair" before in this context. *Easy
enough to understand, though. *It's also easy to believe that it ranks
high as a cause of death or injury. *Do you have ready access to any
numbers?

*Many years ago when I was involved in logging supervision, I used to
receive regular accident reports from Oregon OSHA on serious logging
accidents. *Death & serious injury from barber chairs were always high
on the list. *I imagine OSHA still keeps such statistics.

Many
(including Birch) are quite prone to splitting as you described
sometime during the back cut - especially if they have a heavy lean.

I've seen it happen a couple of times myself. *Didn't know that birch
was a frequent offender.

Though many saw hands scoff at the practice as being sissy, the safest
way to fell such trees is to bind the butt (immediately above where
the top of the notch cut will be) with heavy duty nylon webbing (made
to handle the extreme forces involved) before starting any cuts.

This, too, is news to me. *I'd appreciate any more inofrmation you
could provide as I'll be doing a lot of cutting here in the next few
months.

I probably should have used the term strapping rather then webbing.
The type of nylon web strap that log truck drivers in many areas use
to bind down their loads is what is used. Any good saw shop in an area
where there is much commercial logging going on could make one up for
you in a size to handle the size trees you will be working with. *It
should be used on any tree with a very heavy lean (especially
hardwoods) or one with a very unbalanced crown (heavy in the direction
of fall).

The
old saying that "There are bold timber fallers and there are old
timber fallers, but few are lucky enough to be old bold timber
fallers." is quite true.

There have been times and arenas in life when I've flirted with the
bold thing. *I was lucky. *I try hard not to do that anymore. *Never
did it in connection with tree falling. *But, like just about anyone,
I suppose, I've been careless on occasion. *I don't think Karl was
particularly bold.....and he was certainly getting old at 69. *He may
or may not have been careless.....I don't know whether he had ever
heard of the practice of binding trees with webbing.

At any rate, it now looks as if this "bad luck" may have been
preventable. *Casts the whole mess in a different light.

Much to think about.

Thanks, Bob

giles

Bob Weinberger * *DuPont, WA

Hi, everyone. *Wolfgang - thanks for that story, entertaining and
thought provoking, as always. *And thanks, Bob, too, for sharing from
your expertise.

Please forgive this question - I'm not too embarrassed to say that I
don't quite get the mechanics of this accident.

google image search of "logging accident barber chair" produced this:http://www.forestryforum.com/images/...arberchair.jpg

Is the issue that part of the tree from *below* the intended cut gets
split along with the main part of the tree and that's what swings up
with bad potential results?

There's also this youTube moviehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2YAf61zz5VU&feature=related

You can see the other problem with a barber chair (other than the
potential of getting hammered by the snapping butt); you lose control
of where the tree falls. It can be hard to get out of the way of a 70
foot tree unless you can run 70 feet in under a second.

Interestingly, a young man who frequently worked with Karl on
harvesting trees for firewood stopped by yesterday to visit the scene
of the accident. After listening to my description of the scene and
my thoughts on the most likely chain of events he went out to look for
himself. He came back with an alternative theory.

He insisted that when the split occured the tree could not possibly
have been moving fast enough to catch Karl on the upswing. He is
absolutely certain that Karl watched it as it rose and then failed to
move out of the way as it came down and crashed into his face. He
bolstered his argument by pointing to Karl's cap, which was lying
under the butt of the tree about where Karl's feet were when he was
found. I remain unimpressed by the cap's position as it could have
been knocked just about anywhere, at any time, regardless of what
actually happened. Hell, for that matter, he could have taken it off
as a gesture of respect for the providence that was about to smite
him.

I am also dubious about the alternative theory for a couple of
reasons. In the first place, despite the fact that I was unfmaliar
with the term, I've seen the "barber chair" phenomenon on a number of
occasions.....the **** moves plenty fast enough to kill. Second, The
illustration at the site provided by dr. narcolepsy:

http://www.forestryforum.com/images/...arberchair.jpg

is all too clear, and I assume that on a site dedicated to forestry
and inhabited by folks who presumably know what they are doing, an
illustration showing a rare exception to the rule of what might happen
would be labelled as such. Third, the ever faithful and useful
Occam's razor. There appears to be no justification for the
complicating factor of a tree rising slowly past the sawyer who then
sits immobile while watching it fall on his head. Finally, what I
will take the liberty of calling the classic scenario accounts
beautifully for Karl's position, lying flat on his back with his feet
near the stump and the massive injury to the left side of his face,
given that he was obviously cutting in the usual posture.....the
expected direction of fall to the left of the sawyer, as evidenced by
the saw, whose blade was still in the cut on the stump when I
arrived. Had the tree in fact caught him on the way
down.....certainly not impossible, despite the apparent evidence to
the contrary.....it seems unlikely that he would have been lying in
the position and posture in which he was found.

All of this, of course, could easily be dismissed as idle (and perhaps
even morbid and sordid) speculation....for anyone but a forensic
pathologist or other investigator with some sort of legitimate
professional interest.....except that the young man alluded to above
stated that his own interest was on behalf of the family, who wanted
to know what happened.

Well, they never will. None of us will.

However, they will get a more or less plausible scenario. And given
that most of us get through life just fine with precious little but
implausible (not to say absurdly impossible) scenarios.....things
should work out just fine.

giles
who, due to complicating factors that would doubtless bore all the
ravenous fishin' stuff devotees on site, does not expect to be
consulted on the matter.