change of career

[Minotaur]

I am 46 been in the game 7 years now - did a bit when I was a youngster, but got sick and tired of the industry I was in. So 7 years ago I re-trained got my tickets and got a job with a contractor who work the railways etc - mainly get up to date with the current legislations and re-new my work skills. Hard work, but worked in a good team of lads, but there was some complete idiots too and the money was sh*te!

Managed just under 12 months then went out on my own. I contract a few experienced lads when I have bigger or more technical jobs, otherwise just crack on. I really enjoy the freedom off the job, working in the trees and the great outdoors. But down here in Kent there are so many itinerant workers - Eastern Europeans, our traveller un-friends, more pikkies, more pi**ies, and then some guys who don't mind working for labourers wages!

 

Ho-hum crack on and enjoy, but make sure you fully undestand all the job entails - hard work, gaining the trust of customers, dealing with all the sh*t from those listed ubove and the large investment in saws, ropes, kit, truck, chipper, etc.

Edited February 12, 2012 by Minotaur
correcting grammar

[White Noise]

Yeah coz you risk dying a slow nasty death if you breath in a single particle of the stuff

 

How many of us have played on Asbestos garage roofs as kids ?

 

Me and most of my friends that's for sure

[Minotaur]

How many of us have played on Asbestos garage roofs as kids ?

 

Me and most of my friends that's for sure

 

 

Def agree with the above, but the killer with asbestos is the fine dust when you break it up.

 

Recently a friend of my wife had the following happen to her family:

 

Father in law who is a retired squaddie became ill, eventually he was diagnosed with asbestosis, and after quite some discussions it was decided the only contact he'd had with asbestos was when he knocked down an old garage at theirs long term forces property. Father in law passed away, then within 3 months my wifes friends husband, his brother and sister all became ill. Yep all diagnosed with asbestosis and all died 6-9 months later. They had all helped the father knocked down garage and dispose of it. They even remembered rolling balls of asbestose which they threw at each other and kicked about!

 

Amazing what people did not so long ago that with a bit more info...............

[Pedroski]

That's why now there are really stringent safety measures in place for when doing asbestos removal, and plenty of tickets to take starting with P402. I'm going to do mine.... and then I'm thinking of the IRATA course for people wanting to do industrial abseiling. Each is only 4 days and there is possibility of financial help to do them.

[WorcsWuss]

Burying my uncle on Tuesday, asbestosis from working with lifts in the 80's. Not nice stuff. I encounter it frequently in my work but we don't go smashing through it with drills like they used to!

[Mozza]

Real shame hearing the stories of lost loved ones. If only they'd of known back then.

 

These days I'm pretty sure that modern asbestos removal would be safer than tree work.

[Matthew Storrs]

aagh, your all scaring me know, I dismantlled the asbestos on my shed a few years ago, but I damped it all down, oh well, time will tell.

[Jamie]

Rich, have you thought about your IRATA ticket, your plastering experience may go well with fireproofing. A company called Hertel do lots of industrial lagging and pipe insulation. do that on the ropes and you may be onto a winner. Try Rigg access for a forum about IRATA and abseiling stuff.

 

Jamie

[Pedroski]

Jamie, a friend's husband was working for a tree firm down here in Sussex up until a few years ago. Loves the outdoors but got fed up with them taking the mick with wages and all. Now doing industrial abseiling on some big stadium project in Ireland squirting expanding foam into bit where there shouldn't be holes. That's what got me thinking about doing the IRATA ticket - I can climb, abseil, paint, squirt foam, take pics and all, but I really want to somehow combine it with contaminated stuff as well.... I see you've mentioned the IRATA stuff before - do you do much in the way of industrial ab work? How's it paying, compared with £100 per day (minus expenses minus tax etc)?

[Stereo]

The dangerous stuff is the blue insulation type stuff inside walls and the like. Also used on subs which is why so many submariners got it.

 

Concrete fibre roofs do often have asbestos but as I understand it, it is the white variety and a million times less harmfully as its harder to release strands into the air and even if you do breathe it the strands are far less likely to catch in your lungs due to their shape and length.

 

I'm no expert but that's what I read.