Anybody up for some free climbing?

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cwill

Member
Oct 13, 2010
182
W. MI
On certain jobs downtown & around metro area I've been up 30+ floors during new office tower construction & had to climb 150 ft+ up scaffolding before either the outside temp cage elevator or the permanent inside ones were installed & it never bothered me.

But nothing remotely this extreme.I hope he's getting at least twice his normal hourly pay scale.Ironworkers around here used to get 'hazard pay' once they got above a certain height.Dont know if they still do though.
 
Lol, I remember at my old job when we'd get slow, I'd hop in a forktruck basket (actually it was just a wire basket that was kind of falling apart) and clean the beams up top... Only maybe 30-40ft up. Every once and awhile I would feel sick to my stomach and be like oomg take me down. I can't imagine that... I mean what happens if you have a seizure, you faint, or something like your hand cramping up... That would kind of suck if you pass out for a few seconds then wake up in the middle of your fall... I would wear a parachute :)

Surprised they don't do that by helicopter.
 
I'm gonna throw up.

Actually, though, I used to climb rocks with the Iowa Mountaineers at the University of Iowa. Sounds like an oxymoron, 'cause there are no mountains in Iowa. We usually climbed at Devil's Lake, WI, or at a park on the Mississippi River that was called Palisades something-or-other. (Edit: Mississippi Palisades. Duh.) Highest I ever got was maybe 400 feet. The drop was called "exposure," and just the word is enough to make butterflies in my stomach.

The Iowa Mountaineers were a town-gown thing. The folks with money went on actual mountain-climbing trips in the summer. Everest, K2, places like that. We poor students got to see their films in the winter.

We had a club bus that had had all the seats removed. We'd all sit on the floor with our laps covered by a tarp. No heat. We camped out on the snow. I remember a chaperon who was a dental student. His name was Vic W--- and he drove a VW bug. He thought it was nice of them to put his initials on the car.

The rock formations we climbed had colorful names: Open Bible, Pseudo Hawk's Nest, Lonesome Sister, Sentinel, Cleopatra's Needle...

I got plastered at a bar in Baraboo, WI, on 15-cent beers in huge steins. I had gone to Devil's Lake over Thanksgiving break with three guys. We all stayed in the same tent. And NOTHING HAPPENED. Other than the rock climbing.

Some things you never forget. Those were the days...

Nancy
 
PS-- And the big hit on the radio was "Big Girls Don't Cry."
 
yooperdave, you can climb. I'll stay on the ground and watch.
 
F dhat!!! :gulp: I'm still dizzy from vertigo.
 
The part around 4'10" where he reaches a level and is fumbling around for a handhold made me queasy. After replacing roof tiles on my 2 1/2 story house, I decided I'd pay the installation fee to have someone else install my chimney liner for my pellet stove.
 
Egads . . . I've seen this before and had the same queasy feeling watching this video again . . . the higher he goes the worse it gets as the ladders look smaller and more spindly. I keep thinking what would happen if there was a strong gust of wind . . . definitely not my line of work.

That said . . . I used to work with a guy who made half decent money climbing towers to change out antennas or lightbulbs.
 
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