They call them "Widow Makers" for a reason... My worst widow maker was when I was felling some Hack. It had a bark beetle in it that would cause some of the trees to be rotted about 12 feet up. It was only in 3-4 trees to the acre, but on this one tree, I felled it, and 12 feet up the tree snapped in half and struck me right on the head. I was wearing a helmet (I always do), but later the chiropractor put me on a machine to help stretch my spine: I had compressed it by 1/2 an inch from the impact. That took awhile to heal. But it is a good logging accident if you can walk away from them.
Scary stuff. Glad you're ok! As far as felling Even small branches pack quite the punch. Most my felling is big, tangled woods junk. A helmet is on my need to have list, and I'm hardly the"ppe" type of guy. The amount of stuff that comes from the tops is crazy, big trees have 80+ foot radius tops danger zone is huge.
I had a small limb bounce off my helmet a few weeks ago when felling, first time it's ever happened and glad I had the helmet on!
A lot of people do not know this, but hearing protection is not just about hearing conservation, hearing high pitched sounds like chainsaws also makes you extremely fatigued. I wear hearing protection a lot for this reason: on my bulldozer, skidder, around the sawmill, heck even mowing the lawn. I have enough problems with fatigue, I can at least do something about some of it!
I learned my lesson about hard hats a long time ago. I was around 15 and my father said from now on we were going to wear hard hats in the woods. I resisted, but he laid down the law. That very day I had a widow maker come down and hit my hard hat, and it is very rare to see me now with a chainsaw and not have a hard hat on (with ear muffs). Now keep in mind I do not own a pair of chaps, so I am hardly an all-out PPE kind of guy.
That is the set I got. I told my wife I wanted saw chaps for Christmas last year. Bless her heart she got me the most beautiful set of biker chaps you have ever seen. Had to return them and get the proper chaps.
There has to be a yooper joke in there, somewhere. In all seriousness, I think falling chunks or trees / branches are the most overlooked danger in felling trees. I've got a forestry helmet on my list for Christmas that I hand my wife every year. I've got a big dead standing beech that's worth a few BTUs that I will not cut without a spotter and a helmet. There's a branch in it that I know will drop when cutting the trunk. Maybe I just go ahead and play tree dominoes to smack the beech up and get it to drop that death from above. It's actually a pretty decent sized piece, and 25' up it would render any PPE useless.
Whenever someone dismisses the danger of smaller trees, leaders, and branches, I suggest they compare the girth of the piece of wood they are saying is nothing to worry about, to a baseball bat, then ask them how they feel about possibly getting struck by it. It's amazing how abruptly their view of the situation swings around.
Hey, thanks for starting this thread as a reminder for some and a wake up call for others. A few years ago I finally but chain saw chaps and a loggers helmet with muffs and face screen. I got them because I figured my luck might be running out and it just a plain good investment. HERE's the thing I have thought about since I bought them a few years ago: 1) I was damm lucky for a lot of decades that something bad didn't happen. 2) WE ALL have a sense of joy at how much money we save on electric/oil/LP...but how many of ever think of putting just a bit of that money we save on heating fuel into safety gear?...seems like that should be a no brainer...but it took me nearly 50 years to figure that out. I have saved thousands over the years heating with wood...but never would spend the money for helmet and chaps...now I am looking at the Husky chainsaw boots, need to learn more about them.
Glad you're ok. Hope to get more PPE myself. I do wear steel toe boots, ear plugs and safety glasses.
One of my best friends! To orient, that would be my inner thigh area. Never new it was there until putting them on again some time later.
Last year I had my @$$ handed to me by a branch, sawing away happily next thing people are asking me if I know my name what day it was....... I bought a skull cap shortly after. Bought chaps a few years ago but never wear them even though I should. Chaps, chain brakes etc weren'taround when I started sawing so I guess I have a lot of bad habits to break.
my screws were knocked loose way before then my friend.......probably started loosening by the nuns yardstick.
