Climbing a 1,700ft tower repairman
 

Oh wow, you couldn't pay me enough, these guys have some serious minerals.

Trust me, this is a worthy view, scared of heights or no. Personally I would rather have someone shooting at me again..... :eek:

http://www.todaysbigthing.com/2010/09/15?ref=nf

F that, maybe with a parachute....

I am typically not afraid of heights... but just watching that made me feel dizzy.

I'd do it... damn... forgot my #1 phillips. I think I'd be more concerned about the transmissions cooking my liver, the fall would be a no brainer... enjoy the ride!

More balls than brains. Not afraid of heights, but no way.

Safer Than Riding 2 Wheels
 

Design, erecting & maintaining antenna towers & spires is definitely safer than riding 2 wheels, especially bicycles, based on my 30+ years of doing both.

In Chicago, I have been one of the highest paid engineers in the world, not highly paid (only elevation wise). Very few skyscrapers have surmounted Sears Tower (now "Big Willie") in height but it is still is the tallest building in the Americas in the category of highest occupied floor.

I spent literally months (if not years combined) hanging off Sears, Hancock, Prudential, AT&T and several free-standing & guy towers over the past 4 decades. I also inspect their curtain walls. Guy towers are the trickiest and most unsafe usually due to their age (many are 70+ years old) and because they are often AM tower; i.e., the tower itself is the antenna and must be isolated from ground (earth). BTW, when I hang-10 on the east Tower on Sears, I'm at 1764 AGL. If you take a whiz, your piss ends up in Indiana (which deserves it).

Attached are some photos I've taken from different vantage points in Chicago, which I usually don't bother to do because I really don't look around much while working anymore unless its an exceptionally nice day. Wind is always an issue but I work year round. In 1983 when we designed & put up the main towers on Sears, it was 40 degrees BELOW zero F WITHOUT windchill. On FM towers we work at night when they switch to their stand-by antennas so the don't cook us like in a microwave oven with 5 million watts. The Sky Crane helicopters had a hard time lifting off because each tower section is over 20,000 pounds. BTW, I once realized it was my B-day when I was on Hancock's roof one night, and when you are on the roof of AON Center (formally Amaco, sister building structurally to the now belated WTCs, which was a scary on 9-11), your about 45 feet above the roof of Hancock.

wow, fuck that. i dont like getting off my ladder on to the roof of my garage to fix my dish, haha. although ive got a buddy whos a sky dive instructor and him and his friends climbs antennas and jump off them.

it just seems like it would be safer to skydive down. That is all I am saying.

I don't have a fear of heights. I have a fear of blunt-force trauma!!

I did it for 7 years; we could build to 900' but regularly did antennas and maintenance on 2000'. It's a young man's sport...

Agreed... Rather be ducking for cover than doing that climb...

And yeah, I'd much rather jump out of a perfectly functioning aircraft as well... That doesn't scare me much...

But the idea of climbing one of those things to jump? Nuhu... No way... The jumping I don't mind, the climbing is not my thing...

I never made it above @300' as I did work mainly for wifi and we don't need the height for transmission. Still knew when I was out of practice when I would get to the top tired and hated the thought of not being at 100% while free climbing.

I've had a few scares with tower structures failing (one tower bent like an "S" while climbing), but the worst was every year when the yellow jacket wasp's would swarm towers to get the warmth. They were harmless but being alergic and at the top of a tower covered in them always freaked me out. I would chant in my head while climbing, "don't flinch, don't flinch" in case they stung me while sweeping them off the ladder.

It's a scary job but you do get a vantage point that few ever see. I remember being on the top of a tower on a 3000' ridge seeing a small plane flying lower than I was hanging.

I kept mumbling "oh, HELL no" and "f*#k me" as I was watching the video.

Just remember, if the shock of the fall doesn't kill you, the sudden stop at the end will.

jeez, u kidding me....i have goosebumps and shivers in my hands...no way in hell would i do that...

one, and i mean ONE wrong move and you got about 30 seconds of swearing at yourself before the big long sleep...

I worked as an electrician for 5 years in the late '70s. When we did residential service changes, we had to cut the live 220v service drop wires, strip back the insulation with a pocket knife and splice them onto the new service wires...all done on the roof. When I started that job, my boss told me, "Don't worry about the shock, the fall is what will kill you".

Two story pitched roofs freaked me out though. It's not so much the height, but the exposure. The service riser is always at the edge of the roof.

One time my boss plugged the meter in while I was still making the last splice...:shock: That was quite a jolt, and I was glad it was just a single story, even though I maintained my balance.

Then there was the time I was on the next to the top rung of a 28' extension ladder, installing a lighting fixture on the side of a concrete building with Santa Ana winds blowing. I don't know how I did that one. Even with my helper on the ground steadying the ladder.

As far as climbing a tower without an enclosure...too much exposure for me.

Came back for a second look at this video, My mind kept returning to the 1/2 bolts that were "BENT"- Yeah, the one at the top / that are sticking out of that piece of pipe( the bolts that would be supporting my fat ass, and that 30 pound bag ).

I generally don't mind heights but there is no way you could get me up there. I'm absolutely shocked that with todays standards its not mandatory for them to be tied off all the time.

I couldn't climb that without being tied in, and I wouldn't be able to do the way down. Jumping off the top with a chute would be way easier for me.

Clipping in and out gets your lanyard lines in the way and causes a lot more work and time. It actually wears you out a lot faster which creates mistakes. You do focus on keeping three points of contact at all times. I would have clipped in at the transition where you see him looking for hand holds. That part made me pucker up. :eek:

My first time repelling, when I had to jump backwards off a cliff, the first time I had to step out onto the wing strut of a T-Craft to skydive, the first time I accidentlally wheelied sitting sidesaddle at the start of an AAMRR race(jumpstart race) at Summit Point we're some of the times i was scared shitless. If I had to climb into the clouds I can tell you that I would try not to look down haha, measure every movement, keep breathing to stay alert, focus intensely on what i was doing, and kiss the ground when I got back to earth, whether it be a hard or soft landing.:D

My wife would have no problem climbing one of those towers. She used to be a hard core rock climber. Trad climbing, not sport climbing...as she says, "sport climbing is neither".

As for me...my balls were tingling just watching that video.:eek:

I'm not afraid of hieghts, I'm afraid of widths

so we can safely assume that you won't be jumping the canyon anytime soon huh?

So, if your wife wants to get rid of you, all she has to do is climb a hill then. haha:D

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