Had a chat with a retired foundry guy at my local diner in Toledo last Tuesday

He said he never used a safety harness in 40 years and got mad when I mentioned OSHA standards. Made me wonder if old school toughness or new school safety actually keeps you alive longer in this trade.

3 comments

3 Comments

hernandez.gavin10d ago

Whoa, hold on there. I gotta push back a little on the whole "40 years without a harness" thing. I mean, sure, he survived, but surviving doesn't mean it was smart. Luck plays a huge role in that kind of thing, you know? OSHA rules weren't written by some pencil pusher in an office. They came from real guys getting killed or broken in half from falls. Your foundry guy might have been tough (and probably was), but he was also rolling the dice every single shift. I'll take the new school safety gear any day over hoping I don't slip at the wrong moment. It's not about being soft, it's about not ending up in a wheelchair or worse by the time you hit retirement.

anthony_jackson3110d ago

Funny timing on you bringing this up. My uncle was a rigger on a high rise crew back in the 70s, and he always bragged about never wearing a lanyard. Then one morning he steps on an icy beam and his boot slips. He caught himself on a rebar stub, but it ripped open his whole forearm down to the muscle. Took 40 some stitches and he couldn't work for three months. He still says it was just bad luck, not the lack of a harness. Go figure.

taylor_wells10d ago

Read an article about this a few months back that looked at old injury logs from steel mills in the 50s and 60s. Something like one in four guys had some kind of permanent damage by the time they hit 55. A lot of them were missing fingers or had bad backs from those years without any gear. Your foundry guy made it out okay, but the numbers show most guys didn't. Luck is a real thing, but it's not a plan.