Logging Safety

BACKGROUND: A logger was felling hardwood timber on an early spring day in the Northeast. Weather was not a factor in the incident. A skidder operator was also working on the same site. PERSONAL CHARACTERISTICS: The logger, in his late 30s, had worked in the woods for...

BACKGROUND: On a sunny, cool day in the Appalachians, a chain saw operator was topping a large yellow-poplar tree that he had just felled. PERSONAL CHARACTERISTICS: The 41-year-old chain saw operator’s normal function on the logging crew was to stump and top trees. He...

BACKGROUND: On a spring day in the Southeast, a log truck unloaded under an overhead crane at a pulp mill and then traveled empty to a satellite woodyard, where the driver expected his trailer to be loaded. PERSONAL CHARACTERISTICS: The log truck driver was an...

BACKGROUND: On a late winter morning at a log landing in the Appalachians, a maintenance mechanic and a logging crew member were installing a replacement cutting edge on a skidder blade. Weather conditions were fair and cold. PERSONAL CHARACTERISTICS: Both the...

BACKGROUND: The owner-operator of a self-loading pulpwood truck with an attached pup trailer was loading the truck body with pulpwood. The loader was rear-mounted on the truck frame to allow the operator to load both the truck and pup trailer. It was a cold, late fall...

BACKGROUND: On a clear and sunny March day in the Lake States, two U.S. Forest Service employees were returning to their duty station, driving a pickup truck on a county portion of a forest road. The pickup was towing a trailer with two snowmobiles on board. The...