Saved by the belt

by Clair Urbain

Two workers fell from heights on jobsites and lived to tell about it, thanks to their fall arrest harnesses.

Robert Goldschmidt Jr. and Todd Johnson are like many of the guys you work with on your construction site. Hard working. Sincere. Long on smiles, short on words. Friendly guys you like to be around.

But one thing sets these two apart from most everyone else: Both survived a fall at work that could have been fatal. Thanks to their safety harnesses and proper training on how to use them, they are here to tell about their falls.

In part, they are here because Goldschmidt’s employer, Lunda Construction Company, and Johnson’s employer, Schwab Company, are taking part in the Fall-Safe program developed and overseen by the University of West Virginia, Safety and Health Extension.

Implemented by the Construction Safety Council in Chicago, Illinois and the St Paul Insurance Co. of St. Paul, Minnesota, the Fall-Safe plan helps contractors develop or improve their fall protection programs and manage them better. It includes training at all levels of the company and follows up with audits and meetings to make sure companies follow safety practices.
(Go to www.wvu.edu/~exten/depts/she/fallsafe.htm for more information.)

Goldschmidt and Johnson are a bit reserved talking about an accident that could have taken their lives, but they consider themselves lucky.

The most recent statistics report that 335 construction workers die from falls on the job every year. That’s very close to one a day, and almost two a day when you back out weekends, holidays and vacation time. Effective fall protection plans such as the Fall-Safe program can help reduce these fatalities.

Goldschmidt grateful
Robert Goldschmidt Jr. started his workday on October 11, 2001 like any other. Showing up on the bridge project in downtown Milwaukee, Wisconsin, he slipped into his fall protection harness and went to work.

As a member of the Local 113 Laborers Union, Goldschmidt was trained in the use of fall protection, which was augmented by training from Lunda Construction Company based in Black River Falls, Wisconsin. Lunda is one of 10 midwestern contractors participating in the Fall-Safe national research program through St Paul Fire and Marine Insurance.

“I was working on top of the bridge falsework which we were preparing for a pour,” says Goldschmidt. “I was walking on the 2" x 6" double girder with a grade strip and I suddenly lost my balance and fell.

“It happened so fast I couldn’t react. You think about trying to catch onto something, but you fall too fast and too hard,” he says. “I was carrying a 16' grade strip perpendicular to the girders. When I fell, the strip caught on the girders but broke in two from the impact.

“The first thing I thought was, ‘Sh__!’ and the retractable web lanyard already had caught me, just as it was supposed to. Since I was tied off to the side, I swung in and hit the girder, which hurt, but I only fell a few feet. The harness didn’t hurt me at all, but it may be more of a jolt if you fell 15' or 20' before the lanyard caught.

“There I was, hanging 30' over railroad tracks. I laughed. I was glad I had tied off,” he says.

Goldschmidt climbed up from his brush with death and went back to work. Minutes later, a train barreled through under the bridge. If he had fallen onto the tracks, there would have been no way to stop the train in time.

“I always tie off. It’s not worth taking the risk. The two seconds it takes to tie off is nothing compared with the consequences of a fall. Even if I am carrying a joist across the bridge with another guy, I’ll tie off. It is a bit of a hassle as you come to the static line pole and have to move your lanyard to the next section, but I won’t do it any other way,” he says.

Johnson’s mistaken step
It was a hot, sticky day July 16, 2001, when Todd Johnson, an ironworker for the Schwab Company based in Winona, Minnesota, took a fateful misstep that nearly cost him his life.

“We were working on a church project in Winona and I was laying and setting metal decking for the ceiling. It was a hot day, and perspiration kept building up on my prescription safety glasses. We’d snap the line, then tack-weld the decking to the joist. We were moving at a good speed, getting a lot done.

“We were working about 14' off the ground, and the sweat kept affecting my glasses. I was tied off to the cable above me that was attached to the building columns. I don’t know what happened. But I think I didn’t see the edge and took one step too far.”

Like Goldschmidt, Johnson’s first thought was, “‘Sh_ _t! What the hell am I doing?’ It happened so fast that I wasn’t even aware of the harness catching me. My face smashed into a metal stud on the way down, and I was going straight down like a dart until the lanyard caught me. Then it pulled me upright and I knocked my head a good one again on the stud. I was left hanging there, with a bloody nose and a bump on my head, about 4' from the floor. But I was alive.”

Another worker got a stepladder and positioned it so Johnson could detach the lanyard and climb down.

“I was a bit shaky and my nose was bleeding. I wanted to go back to work, but my supervisor kept asking if I wanted to go and get checked out by a doctor. I had to fill out an accident report, but went right back to work.”

“When I first started wearing the harness and tied off with the lanyard, I thought it seemed to slow me down. But before long, I got used to it. The new harnesses and lanyards are getting better all the time so they are even more comfortable. The best way to prevent a fall is to tie off all of the time. I had an accident. It took only one wrong move and I couldn’t catch myself. You can’t pull yourself back once you start to fall,” he says.

Johnson credits the safety training he received through Schwab Company’s involvement with the Fall-Safe program for saving his life. “I always tied off before, but in the training, they pointed out that it’s best to tie off above you because that, in effect, shortens the lanyard so you don’t fall as far below your work surface. If I would have tied off lower, I could have hit the ground before the fall protection stopped me.

“I also learned a shock-absorbing lanyard may not be the right one to use when working at the heights I was when I fell. It could have stretched to the point that I would have hit the ground.

“The training also pointed out that I wasn’t wearing the harness correctly. I was wearing it too loose around my chest, which means I could have slipped out in the face-first fall that I had. I also learned that you can’t tie off to just anything. Tie-offs must be able to take the force of a fall,” he adds.

After the fall, word traveled fast on the jobsite. “You feel a bit stupid for taking a fall and it took me away from the job for a couple hours while we filled out paperwork. But I think it woke me up – and others I work with – to the need for fall protection and safe work practices all the time,” he concludes.

Published in the July/August, 2002 issue of Contractor Tools and Supplies magazine.

back to top