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Two-rope Working - an update


AA Teccie (Paul)
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Could someone enlighten me how (if the mood took me) I am able/allowed to free climb up a mountain face, high dive off a cliff, kayak down a mountain river , wrestle an angry otter for bets, etc etc (....insert dangerous sport here) but I am not allowed as a self employed adult human being to climb a tree on a CE marked, tested, recognised system of MY choosing ?
Surely the risk is mine solely to take and evaluate and that is a basic human right so long as you are not posing a risk to third parties or dictating others should assume your evaluated risks ?
Yes I can that on larger controlled sites or for companies with employees the implications of this ridiculous legislation will be impactful, but on a small scale , for an individual privately owned tree I am struggling to see how I could risk facing prosecution/prevention in performing my given qualified competencies ?

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10 hours ago, Treerover said:

Could someone enlighten me how (if the mood took me) I am able/allowed to free climb up a mountain face, high dive off a cliff, kayak down a mountain river , wrestle an angry otter for bets, etc etc (....insert dangerous sport here) but I am not allowed as a self employed adult human being to climb a tree on a CE marked, tested, recognised system of MY choosing ?
Surely the risk is mine solely to take and evaluate and that is a basic human right so long as you are not posing a risk to third parties or dictating others should assume your evaluated risks ?
Yes I can that on larger controlled sites or for companies with employees the implications of this ridiculous legislation will be impactful, but on a small scale , for an individual privately owned tree I am struggling to see how I could risk facing prosecution/prevention in performing my given qualified competencies ?

Because, simplistically, you are then "at work", even as a self-employed person, and the HASWA and W@H etc Regs apply.

 

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Because, simplistically, you are then "at work", even as a self-employed person, and the HASWA and W@H etc Regs apply.
 


Thank you for your expansion and clarification Paul.

I can though foresee that should an individual arborist find himself non compliant in the eyes of the HSE and standing before the judge...then a judge will look to what he would surely assume to be the vested interests of the arborists wish for self perseveration on the day of the ‘offence’ ,
the vagaries of Number 3 in the Hierarchy of Approach
and how compelling or expert the prosecutions evidence is on the day that will need to absolutely contradict the trained professional (which is most likely going to be nigh on incredibly difficult/impossible to prove absolute negligence on the part of the arborist especially as mentioned, the judge would assume a vested interest in the individual concerned surviving until the end of his working day PLUS the fact he/she is posing little or more likely zero danger to third parties !!)

I can see some large legal bills for the HSE and some compelling defendants fighting their corner very hard (and let us not forget this can be done as a litigant in person) with far from certain wins for the HSE.

.......but what do I know, I climb trees for a living !!!! WITH ONE ROPE !! ?

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On 01/12/2019 at 13:48, MattyF said:

This is not making the job safer ,it’s a massive hinderance with so much more potential to add risks it’s just ridiculous, as for the statement that we expect people to add more money to jobs, what about people who have priced work and have months of work in the books already , I can’t turn around and give all my clients that I have work lined up for a higher quote because it’s probably going to add at least another two hours to most jobs or can I expect my climbers or ground staff for that matter to manage a minimum of three ropes ,4-5 in the case of rigging dismantles...at this point in the year with weather and light conditions bad it is already a struggle with out 5 ropes getting dragged and tangled around a rigging job.

plus the danger of an extra rope on site being dragged to the chipper.

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plus the danger of an extra rope on site being dragged to the chipper.

I saw a vid on face book a few days back ,the climber went down tied in to the large top he had rigged out, he survived but image if he had the second anchor point it would of torn him in two.. I see some absolutely mental rigging with people tied in to the spar they are rigging off this has always been a big no for me having had rigging points fail and knowing one guy it killed , I think it’s bizarre that it’s taught , further more I’ve seen nptc instructors teach it and rig out bits big enough to fill 4m long forwarding trailers they where rigging on to in an assessment, fair enough if there is no chance of the rigging point failing and interfering or taking out a main anchor points but really this two anchor point rule is going to make this happing a much more likely scenario.
The second scenario is just having a massive cluster of twisted crap on your bridge you unclip one then realise it’s the other and in the confusion of trying to sort this mess out some thing is not put back right... I have personally done this within the last two years as I will use two anchors for traversing a lot in big trees, usually on a shorter line that I know won’t be on the ground ... I think there should be a guide line as well if this is has to precede that the two ropes should be different colours as this is what caused my personal incident getting confused with the two lengths of identical cougar blue !
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