hawc said:
Okay, something weird just happend on the site.

(I overlook the site from the 14th floor of my office and just kind of gaze out there when I caught this.)

Main tower crane is hooked up to one of the big wall forms lying flat on the ground.

It begins to lift it and one of the construction workers sits on the edge of the form as it's going up. It seems like he's riding it up almost as a joke or something.

As it gets about five feet off the ground it stops and the construction worker hops off.

I can then see him on the walkie talkie looking up at the crane operator.

He then throws the walkie talkie down take his hammer out of his belt and throws it hard across the contruction site about forty feet away.

Then he takes his helmet off and throws it hard at the ground and it bounces away.

He then goes and picks everything up and storms around the site for about five minutes by himself.

Then he climbs the big tower crane and the operator and him have a talk and then he heads back down.

What the heck did I just see?!
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crane operator walkie talkied him about how he wasn't allowed to do that, and the crane operator quickly learned that there is at least one employee in the company that needs some anger management courses.
 
no idea, but I presume that it is the crane operators responsibility that he doesn't lift someone 100ft into the air just to have them fall off.
 
Maybe the crane ooperator was told to stop the lift and the guy riding it was told to get off and leave the site for being an idiot. Can you imagine an inspector witnessing that, and the repercussions.
 
hawc said:
Just curious is the crane operator more senior than the other guys on site? What's the hierarchy of a site look like? Who makes more, who makes less? It's strangely fascinating to watch. Who's the lowest paid guy down there?
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It's not a question of seniority so much as autonomy and responsibility. The operator is responsible for every pick he makes. He's definitely a journeyman if he's in the tower crane, but the guy on the ground could be an apprentice or a journeyman. Riding a load is strictly forbidden (the only exception would be something like a rescue basket), but without having seen it it could also be that the operator picked the form without getting a signal. The operators are usually pretty sane guys, but I've had words with a couple rammy ones over the years.

And the operator is getting paid more than the guy putting together forms, but the way it usually works is that the crane is on lease to the guys putting up the structure (whether it's concrete or steel doesn't matter), and so the guy running the crane is getting paid by the same company doing the forms, rods, and concrete.
 
Interesting. Thanks for the explanation. I was really surprised to see the guy who had thrown the fit actually climb all the way up the tower crane. I thought, "Are they going to fight it out 200 feet up in the air?" But they just had words and then he went back down.

Would be interesting to hear Skyjacked weigh in...
 
It's hard to believe anyone could be that stupid. The crane operator could or would loose his job had numb nuts be allowed to continue his insane ride in the sky. Like any other job site, it's not really a matter of hierarchy, but of responsibility and common sense. Each worker is part of a team, that is suppose to be looking out for one another. I totally applaud the crane operator for his actions, as for the clown throwing the temper tantrum, he should be removed from the job ASAP, before he either gets someone killed, or kills himself. It boggles the mind at the utter stupidity of it all. Had it been my site, I'd treat the crane operator to lunch, and fire Mr free ride in the sky the second I saw it.

Decades ago, before my cancer started, I managed to get up to my third year of apprenticeship with the Carpenters Union Local 27. Not sure how much things have changed, but back then, the Ministry of Labour was very strict on every job site I ever worked. Had an inspector witnessed this dude and his insane actions, he'd be fired, and his company seriously fined for allowing this guy to work for them. Seriously, would YOU want someone like him as your coworker? Aside from risking a 100 foot fall, he obviously doesn't give a rats ass about the safety and well being of his fellow workers after throwing a hammer 40 feet, it could seriously injure, or even kill someone. I pray he's canned, and banned from construction work for life, the guy is a walking disaster waiting to happen.
 
Yeah, aside from the whole riding the wall form 5 feet up into the air (because it's hard to tell if the crane operator lifted it without him knowing or whether he thought it would be funny to sit on it while the crane operator was trying to do his job) it seems like it would be against work safe policy to literally throw a hammer 40 feet across a construction site or throw your helmet at the ground and walk around with no helmet on for a minute or so while you 'cool off'

Again, this was so weird to watch. I couldn't figure out what was going on, just that one guy was super mad.
 
Bill 168 puts an onus on the employer to really stamp out those kinds of outbursts. But again, without having been there this could have just as easily been an operator lifting something without getting a signal. The labourer sounds like he overreacted, but that doesn't mean he was automatically in the wrong.
 
My guess:
- Guy took a break
- Crane op lifted without realizing
- Someone called it to stop
- Guy sitting got more of the fault (no sitting on things about to lift) or maybe fired
- Anger tantrum (more likely to happen if there was no further consequences - post firing)
- Tried to push it back to the crane op
 
hawc said:
Yeah, aside from the whole riding the wall form 5 feet up into the air (because it's hard to tell if the crane operator lifted it without him knowing or whether he thought it would be funny to sit on it while the crane operator was trying to do his job) it seems like it would be against work safe policy to literally throw a hammer 40 feet across a construction site or throw your helmet at the ground and walk around with no helmet on for a minute or so while you 'cool off'

Again, this was so weird to watch. I couldn't figure out what was going on, just that one guy was super mad.
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Of course it would be. He could have killed someone. Sorry to be an ass, but I hope this guy is jobless. He could have killed himself or a coworker. Totally unacceptable.
 
Ryan_T said:
My guess:
- Guy took a break
- Crane op lifted without realizing
- Someone called it to stop
- Guy sitting got more of the fault (no sitting on things about to lift) or maybe fired
- Anger tantrum (more likely to happen if there was no further consequences - post firing)
- Tried to push it back to the crane op
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If he was fired, I doubt they'd let him go up to speak to the operator.
 
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