Chainsaw Safety Tips and Training with Andy Wood

Chainsaw safety is more than just a pair of chaps and safety
glasses. The PPE is only there to help reduce the effect of the
mistake you make. To be a competent sawyer or to consistently use
a chainsaw safely takes knowledge of the tool, the tree, and the
environment.  These combined with good body position,
control of the saw, and saw maintenance can delver quality and
productivity when you are working in the woods or in your yard.


In this episode, I speak with Andy Wood, manager of Forest
Products here at MEMIC about history of chainsaw and logging
safety in the North East, how the industry has changed and
different best practices that should be in place for any
business, not just logging, that has someone running a chainsaw.


 


Peter Koch: Hello, listeners, and welcome to the
MEMIC Safety Experts podcast, I'm your host, Peter Koch. And
today, again, we're recording from the studios of Portland Pod.
They've got a full-service podcast, recording and production
studio right here in South Portland, Maine. And if this podcast
sounds good to you. Get a hold of Tanner down at Portland Pod.
You might think that while chainsaw safety is important, it
really doesn't apply to you or the company that you work for
because you're not a logger or an arborist or in another forest
products industry where folks use chainsaws every day. Well,
don't skip this episode because chain saws are everywhere. If you
have green space on your property and a maintenance group,
chances are that there's a chainsaw in the shop or under your
workbench. And even if you don't officially have one, someone on
your team probably does. And it might have come out to expedite a
project or to clean up after a storm at your workplace. So to
address some [00:01:00] of those things, I'm with in the studio
today with Andy Wood, safety management consultant for the forest
products industry here at MEMIC. And we're going to lay out the
reasoning for why chainsaw safety isn't just for loggers,
arborist or property management teams. And in this episode, we'll
talk about how chain saws have entered the workplace, steps that
you or your team can take to assess the chainsaw uses at your
company and how we help chainsaw users at any level maintain safe
work practices in the field. So, Andy, welcome to the podcast
today.


Andy Wood: Well, thanks, Pete. It's great to be
here. I think we both have a lot of experience we can share with
our listeners that hope that they can learn the lessons the easy
way rather than the hard way that we have in the forest products
industry.


Peter Koch: Yeah, totally. Like we've had many
conversations over the years between the businesses that I work
with in hospitality and the recreation field and certainly all
the work that you've done in the forest products industry here at
MEMIC. But even prior to you coming to MEMIC, you've had a lot of
experience within the [00:02:00] forest products industry. So
before we really get into it, tell me a little bit about your
background and your history.


Andy Wood: Sure. Right out of college, it came
out of college with a degree in forest management and went right
into the Maine Northwoods to work as a production woodcutter,
really liked being on the production side of forestry and lived
up, you know, up north, lived in the logging camps up along the
Canadian border for 11 years, worked up there as a production
woodcutter, started my own logging company towards the end, and
then got involved with training when our first logger state
training program, certified logging professional program started.
And then when MEMIC was formed in 1993, I was asked to come and
work with their book of business in the logging industry.


Peter Koch: Right on. So you've got history not
on the insurance side, but you came like a lot of us here at
MEMIC. You've actually come from the industry that you serve now
on the insurance side. So you bring a lot of practical experience
and have seen a lot of changes within the industry itself. So
before we get into some of [00:03:00] that, let's talk about the
real reason why we're here to talk about chainsaw safety. And
let's think about the hazards that the chainsaw poses and some of
the things that happen when you're in the field using a chainsaw
and injuries occur. So what are some of the things that we need
to worry about from an injury standpoint? What are the common
injuries that come out from chainsaw use?


Andy Wood: Sure. Well, one of the first
breakdowns, you know, as a safety consultant we do on injuries is
frequency and severity. And the injuries that we see the most are
not really specific to the chainsaw. They're really across the
board that a lot of different industries will see. So slips,
trips and falls and overexertion. So that would be your back
shoulder arms, muscles, soft tissue injuries. Those are really
the two most common injuries we see and then eye injuries right
after that and when we move. So those injuries are happening all
the time, not usually life threatening, not usually as severe. We
move into the severity side of those. What we see the big
injuries are from. And those are a little [00:04:00] more
specific to the chainsaw. Those are struck by falling objects,
that stuff coming out of the trees, limbs coming out of the
trees, being struck by the tree or dead wood falling in the work
area or being struck by the chainsaw itself or chainsaw cuts. So
those are the severe ones that we have the most serious of.


Peter Koch: Sure. And there's a there's fewer of
the severe ones, but certainly they're out there. You can see him
all the time and then on the news. And then the thing that you
might not think a lot about is those frequent injuries, the slip
and fall injuries, the overexertion injuries. In our experience,
you and I talking about this, you can tie it a lot of those right
back to the chainsaw use itself. And it could be fatigue. It
could be a tension. It could be a result of improper maintenance,
improper skill set, improper training that's causing or
contributing to the slip trips and fall or the overexertion. And
we'll chat about some of those pieces, too.


Andy Wood: Sure. I think, you know, having been
a production woodcutter, I don't think the most physically
[00:05:00] challenging job that I've ever done, particularly in
the summer when it's hot or in the winter when the snow is deep
and you're in an environment that's there's a lot of variables
out there, you know, ground conditions and the forest, it's ever
changing. So, yeah, just having the chainsaw out there is going
to drive some of those, whether it's overexertion or slip strips
and falls. Yeah, sure.


Peter Koch: So let's talk about some of those
severe injuries and. By the chain or struck by a falling object,
and those can range from cuts and lacerations to fatal injuries,
and some of those were actually happened pretty recently here in
Maine. Did you want to you said you did a little bit of research
on some of those, the severe chainsaw injuries prior to coming
here today. So can you talk a little bit about that?


Andy Wood: Sure. I'll go back historically for
the logging production loggers are our most fatal situation there
was struck by during the felling process. So as soon as the trees
started to move, something was coming out of the canopy. You were
struck by falling limbs, falling dead wood. You might be struck
by the [00:06:00] tree itself or struck by the tree after it
bounces off the ground. So that was our number one cause of a
fatality. And while we've moved away from that pretty
substantially with the logging population, we did have actually
three fatalities this past year in Maine, all during chainsaw
tree removal process. And the limited knowledge that we have, we
didn't get to do really detailed background investigations. But
based on what the state troopers put out in the media; they are
very similar. They are all people. All three of these folks were
struck by the tree that they were cutting and died as a result of
it. So we're still having some of those big injuries.


Peter Koch: And where were those fatalities?
They happened to people that were actually working in the logging
industry or these sort of ancillary tasks that they were doing
from a different industry.


Andy Wood: So they were production woodcutters.
They were kind of, I would say, on the fringe. They were people
who did use the chainsaw regularly and they were being paid to
cut wood, [00:07:00] but you wouldn't call them production
woodcutters. And that's really where we see chainsaw operation
today. Not so much with the production chainsaw operator, but,
you know, one was an excavator, so and he was doing site prep,
you know, house lots. So he cuts a little bit of wood and then
does the excavation for that. So he's in a chainsaw off and on
regularly. One was a homeowner, the other two were kind of part
time woodcutters. And so that's really the trend. We see a lot of
the big injuries we've had and these recent fatalities were for
people on the fringe of the industry.


Peter Koch: Right. So we're not actually seeing
the same type of severity coming out of the logging industry. And
we'll talk a little bit about why that happened. But we're seeing
some of the more serious injuries coming out of, like you said,
those the fringe industries. So it's people that will be using a
chainsaw on an ancillary basis. Might be once a week. It could be
once a day. But it's not day in, day out every day, every week,
throughout the entire season, like you would if you were a
production woodcutter or working in the forest products
[00:08:00] industry all the time.


Andy Wood: Oh, that's exactly right. You know,
in the early days with my time at MEMIC, if an injury involved
chainsaws in trees, that would usually come my way. And they were
all production woodcutters. You know, later in the 90s, I started
to see kind of a transition injuries, wood, chainsaw, tree and
type injuries would come across my desk and they wouldn't be
loggers, they would be campground people or ski people that are
all using chainsaws, as these people were, but not full time
production woodcutters. Yeah.


Peter Koch: So what caused that that shift? What
caused the shift from seeing the injuries moving from your
full-time production logging staff or your logging companies to
the businesses that aren't typically considered chainsaw users?


Andy Wood: Well, there's kind of a few things
that happened in tandem throughout the 90s. We did see
substantial mechanization of the forest products industry. So
production logging. We had people running chainsaws on the ground
and extracting [00:09:00] the wood with cable skaters. Everyone
was out on the ground. Everyone was exposed. We've pretty much
mechanized probably to, you know, maybe 95 percent of the wood in
the state of Maine today is cut with machines, heavy equipment.
So our loggers are all heavy equipment operators. So their
exposures still some exposures in the cabs of the machine, but
not the traumatic injuries that we saw with chainsaw operators.
So in the forest products industry, a lot of those have
transitioned into equipment. So those injuries are down. At the
same time, we've seen a lot of things that have created, I think,
a greater chainsaw use for all the ancillary while the other job
descriptions out there, all the other people who were running
chainsaws, I was just part of their job description.


Peter Koch: Before we move off that and talk
about the ancillary stuff, what's another what would you say is
another contributor, not just the mechanization to the reduction
of chainsaw injuries in the logging industry.


Andy Wood: So we back in the late 80s, early
90s, the industry realized that it couldn't continue going
[00:10:00] the way it was, you know, wasn't acceptable to have
people in the hospital anymore. We couldn't get replacement
workers. The cost of doing that, the cost of comp rose
substantially. It was being it was cost prohibitive to run a
legitimate business. So the industry had got together and created
the certified logging professional program and rolled out a lot
of training, a lot of formalized training for loggers and. I
think we'll talk about that a little bit more, but that
definitely that formalized training definitely drove the injury
rates down. So we had a drop in the total number of injuries that
we saw because we had fewer people out there. That doesn't mean
people are any safer. If we look at different ways. You could
look at this and some of the ratios or workers comp, for example,
you know, it's based on per man hour worked. That would give you
a better idea of the fact that the people after the training for
the number of people that are out there, they're actually working
quite a bit safer. So we had a worker’s comp rate that was
pushing 50 cents on a dollar. And now the worker's comp rate for
[00:11:00] chainsaw operators for logger's is in the teens. And
it's been in the teens for probably 12 or 15 years. So that's a
pretty substantial reduction for the guys that are still out
there.


Peter Koch: Yeah, and that's a like you said,
it's a combination of fewer man hours. But still, with the
training people actually changing the methods that they were
using to manually fell a tree. So you get the mechanization
that's helped to reduce the overall fatalities that are there,
but also the training that's there and really the training, as
we've discussed in the past, the training wasn't always designed
from a safety standpoint, although it's been used that way. But
really it was originally brought into play from a production
standpoint. Is that some of the history around the training as
well?


Andy Wood: Well, yeah, the methods that we use
really kind of interesting. You know, our tools have changed. We
started out with a crosscut and  an ax.


Peter Koch: You are old, Andy, I tell you.


Andy Wood: And when we got power saws, we just
kept doing the same thing we did with the crosscut an axe.


Peter Koch: That's true.


Andy Wood: And there's really [00:12:00] a lot
of better techniques we could have today. We didn't really stop
to think that through until we got some formal training and some
guys tried some different things and they worked better. And then
they started with the formal training. They started spreading
that around so we could all learn from that. Yeah, it's quite a
difference. And before I think one thing that the training has
given our industry is we're a little more cohesive and we talk a
lot more communication within the industry is better. So we know
what works and we know what works well and we know how that how
the mechanics of the stunt work. We never stop to think about
that before.


Peter Koch: No, it's a great way for what I've
learned, especially from taking classes with you and then going
on and doing some of my own training with my own accounts is that
you can look at an injury, you can go into the field and you get
the injury report, go back into the field and you could talk to
the operator, talk to the people that were working with them,
look at the stump and pretty much figure out what went wrong,
what skill or what process wasn't followed all the way through to
make [00:13:00] the situation occur that caused the injury. So
it's a pretty neat way from an accident analysis standpoint. And
then going forward, being able to address the specifics of the
cause, whether it's on maintenance or whether it's information
before felling or separation of operation, any of those parts and
pieces can be looked at to determine whether or not or what we
have to work on in order to prevent this from happening again.


Andy Wood: Really kind of interesting. A lot of
variables in the woods, you know, the weather and the tree
conditions and the time of year that you're cutting. And I used
to think there was a lot of things that were beyond your control
and some days what things would work well and some days things
wouldn't. You know, after I took the training myself and really
committed to adopting it, I was amazed how much more control I
had over my work environment. Now, there's still a few variables
out there, but very, very much more predictable than I thought it
was in the beginning. And one of the interesting things I worked
with the labor consultant out of Sweden, Soren Ericsson. He
[00:14:00] was big on being able to predict everything that would
happen. He would take all kinds of information. And he said when
someone starts doing something, I can tell you exactly how it's
going to turn out. And it was amazing how accurately he could
predict things that were going to have both good and bad. And as
we go through the training, you know, we have a certain protocol
that we go through. You mentioned doing follow up on injuries,
accident investigations. It is you can go back to the training
and look at the protocol, the steps that we go through, and you
can usually tell exactly why that injury happened and probably
even predict that it was going to.


Peter Koch: Yeah, so it's really interesting,
all this training is happening around the logging side to help
them with production and then to help them with safety, but it
really didn't trickle down to the other industries that end up
using the chainsaw. And that's really why we're here today,
though not so much talk about why loggers need this process to be
safe, but really it's all the other people. So let's talk a
little bit more about what's driving chainsaw use into the other
the other [00:15:00] industries. So, like you said, we're logging
is becoming more mechanized. We have hand crews out there, but
we're still finding chainsaw injuries. We talked about those
different fatalities. There was really one individual there that
was really working in the forest products industry. The other
two, one was a homeowner, one was a construction worker. And
those types of industries were finding chainsaw use happening all
the time. And I know you and I have had this conversation that
you would end up going to another company, not a logging company,
but you would go to a camp or I would go to a ski area or you'd
go to a property management company or anybody that has a
maintenance group or even a hotel. And you would find that
someone there was using a chainsaw, someone had a chainsaw under
a bench someplace that was their own. Or maybe the company bought
it a long time ago. And it gets pulled out every fall or every
spring to do storm cleanup or winter cleanup. Or maybe they're
creating [00:16:00] they're creating trail access around their
property for guests when they come because they want to have a
more deeper connection with nature. So we're finding a lot of
these happening, like there's more chainsaw use than we know in
industries that were never really thought of to use a chainsaw.


Andy Wood: Going back to the early days when we
were doing training, of course, our focus was on production
loggers. One of the more interesting trainings we had a yacht
company here on the coast of Maine request chainsaw training. And
What are those guys doing with a chainsaw. Well, you know, they
pull all the boats out of the water in the fall and they put them
up on eight by eight cribbing. So, yeah, they weren't cutting
trees down, but they're using their chainsaws to cut these
cribbing into these eight by eight timbers into certain lengths
to keep all the blocks up for summer for winter storage and
maintenance. So they had chainsaws and they were using them
regularly in the fall when they're hauling the boats. So that was
kind of an odd application. But yeah, that chainsaws are really
show up everywhere. The first shot over the [00:17:00] bow that
we knew something was changing was the ice storm of 1998 after
the ice storm of 98. There were a lot of injuries doing storm
cleanup. Everybody was a chainsaw operator for several months
after that. You could not in the state of Maine for a period of
time. You cannot buy a chainsaw because they couldn't ship them
here fast enough. So everybody that had property, every, you
know, everybody that had a tree in the front yard of the
backyard, they were getting their chainsaw out to do storm damage
cleanup. And that's one of the most hazardous applications,
because not only do you have the tree and the chainsaw, but you
have all that energy that's been twisted into that tree, by the
weight of the ice and snow or the wind that brought it down. So,
yeah. And then so that was the first time we saw people actually
outside of the logging industry calling us and requesting
chainsaw training. We did have a lot of injuries around the state
and a couple of fatalities doing storm damage cleanup after that
first big ice storm. And then since then, we've had a lot of you
know, for the Northeast. We actually had a couple of hurricanes,
Hurricane [00:18:00] Irene and Hurricane Sandy. You know, we
didn't see a lot of hurricanes in the past, but the weather
patterns have gotten a lot more severe, whether it's wind or ice
floating or flooding. And those cleanups always bring out
chainsaws. So that's just the changes in weather has been one of
the driving factors to get more chainsaw operation out there in
non logging industries.


Peter Koch: Sure. And you're not always bringing
an operator, a chainsaw operator, someone who's come from the
logging industry to do your storm cleanup or to do your trail
construction or to do any of the chainsaw tasks that you have.
And, you know, frankly, if you grew up in New England or if you
grew up any place where you had property, you maybe your father,
your grandfather or someone in your family would have a chainsaw
and you would learn to use the chainsaw from them. Not really
formal training. So you tend to bring those skills that you've
had from experience or maybe your first experience [00:19:00] was
at the workplace and someone said, hey, you look like you can
handle a chainsaw here, go ahead and cut that firewood in the
pile. And interestingly, whether the trees standing up or the
trees cut in a pile someplace, the dynamics of the saw are the
same. You might not have the same energy that you have with a
standing tree or storm damage tree, but the dynamics are the
same. So understanding a lot of that and how it functions can
help keep you safe. Whether you're cutting firewood in the pile,
you're just cutting a few pieces of wood, you're cutting a couple
limbs off a tree, or you're dealing with twisted, gnarly storm
damaged trees from a hurricane or a tornado or an ice storm.


Andy Wood: Absolutely. And I have to just take
one step back and offer a warning to our listeners. The whole
thing about experience, depending on where you got that
experience, you can have two types of experience. You can have
good and you can have bad experience. And if [00:20:00] you're
not involved with an industry who talks about that all the time,
you might not recognize right up front whether you're having good
experiences or bad experiences. So sometimes people who when at a
particular company, someone needs to do a task with a chainsaw
and you have someone I'm comfortable with, a chainsaw, they may
be comfortable, but their skill set may not be they may have
experiences that were successful but are going to turn south
pretty quick.


Peter Koch: Sure. I'm right in there. I mean, I
was never formally trained. I've never worked in the forest
products industry like yourself, but I've had a lot of experience
with a chainsaw, some of it coming from property management on my
own side at my own house and others coming from work. Actually in
the recreation industry having to use a chainsaw to do cleanup
and given some training, but not real formal training. And when
my eyes got opened after taking my first training with you,
looking at yeah, I was comfortable [00:21:00] with the saw, I
could accomplish the task. But only for luck did I not get
injured with the chainsaw many of the times that I was cutting in
the woods or cutting on the pile, and I never realized that
because my experience, while successful, wasn't actually good. So
I didn't have great experience. I had successful experience, but
didn't have good experience because I wasn't using the saw
actually in the way it was truly designed and not working with it
in ways that help keep me safe.


Andy Wood: Yeah, and I think in the forest
products industry, you know, for production loggers, we really
learned a lot. We learned the same way. You know, I had cut wood
for a lot of years before I had formal training. And they sat
down and explained to us exactly how that stump works. What are
the mechanics of the stump? How does that hinge control the
direction of the stump, a direction of the tree or filing? No one
ever. I mean, I know you put the file across the tooth and it got
better after you'd filed it than before [00:22:00] it was filed,
after you doubled it. But I really didn't know what was going on
until someone sat me down and said, this is the way the tooth
works. This is the way it works to create a chip and this is the
way you need to maintain it. You know, my life got so much
easier, even though I thought I was a good production worker, my
life got so much easier. When someone explains some of those
basic things to me, I'll never forget a time. This was after I
was doing training myself for MEMIC and I had a group of
woodcutters up in northern Maine and there was a couple of
brothers there and in a small community of production logging
community. And these guys were looked up to as being one of the
biggest production crew, you know, in the area. And they did.
They worked hard and they put out a lot of wood. And we're in the
training and we were introducing the Borca, something that we
really had never done until someone in formal training showed us
how it worked and the benefits of it. And when I cut into that
tree, the guys stood there, you know, their jaws dropped down and
they just stared. And [00:23:00] I'll never forget, one brother
walked over and he whacked his brother and he said, How come we
never thought of that? We've been cutting, what, for 30 years?
That makes so much sense. How come we never thought of that? You
know, and it was interesting to think that these guys were
production woodcutters and, you know, they were well respected.
And it's just something until someone explains that to you,
you're not going to figure it out on your own.


Peter Koch: Right. And it overall, it's a pretty
complicated tool when you actually understand how it works. And
there's a lot to how that saw tooth creates a chip in the
relationship to that and the mechanics of the stump. And that was
one of the aha moments that I had with training with you, as well
as the not just the need for PPE, but the need for planning your
cut and all of the other parts that go with it. And when all
those pieces are in place, the there's still an opportunity for
injury and failure there, but it's a lot more controllable and
you can be more successful that way. So there's a lot of aha
moments when we start talking about training and how when
[00:24:00] people's eyes are opened through explanation, it
really helps connect some dots for them.


Andy Wood: Yeah, the chainsaw is a very
unforgiving tool and there are a lot of variables out there. If
you look at all the other tools that you have, you know, you have
your skill saws, you know, they have electric breaks on and they
have guards that come over that spring back over the saw your
table saws guarded. You have got the saw stop. There's a if you
look at the chain side, something you pick up and walk around
with in your hand and the bars expose the whole time, it is kind
of a hazardous tool. So we want to have as much control over our
work environment as we can because it is the hazard. You know,
it's never going to go away when you're running a chainsaw or.


Peter Koch: Let's take a quick break so I can
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conversation.


Peter Koch: So let's talk about how the
challenges or how the hazards and exposures for using a chainsaw
are controlled. And let's start a little bit about we'll start at
the bottom of our hour control hierarchy and we'll talk about
PPE, for example. So when you're using a chainsaw, what are the
different ways [00:27:00] or what are the different PPE pieces
that you need and what goes into making sure you have the right
PPE for a chainsaw use?


Andy Wood: Right. So, you know, in the training,
we start out with our initial training, our intro with PPE. The
big thing to keep in mind is PPE does not eliminate a hazard.
It's going to help mitigate the hazard if something goes wrong.
But it's not going to eliminate a hazard. It's important that,
you know, we look at no matter what type of PPE we're looking at,
we need to know that it met the industry standard. So everything
you have out there is rated by somebody, your microwave, your
chainsaw, the seat belt in your car. Somebody does testing on
those. So we want to know that the PPE that you have meets the
industry standards. We need to know that it's in serviceable
condition. Is it still in good enough condition to work the way
it was designed to? And then we need to know that you are using
it consistently and properly in the field all the time.


Peter Koch: So that makes total sense. So those
are the three conditional parts is when it's certified to it's in
serviceable condition [00:28:00] and three, that it's being used.
And part of that is making sure that it fits correctly. So those
are the three things that are common across any piece of personal
protective equipment that you're required to use. So let's talk
about the different PPE or just list the different PPE that's
required for chainsaw use.


Andy Wood: Right. So if we start right down at
your feet, of course, safety boots, the logging standard would
say that they are steel toe and they're actually have cut
resistance, leg protection. You can wear the chaps or you can
wear the pants. Either way, there's a certain performance
standard that they have to meet. Protection for the head
hardhats, the eye protection hearing, protection and use of
gloves and high viz is not specifically in the logging standard,
but it's situational. So a lot of times, depending on what other
hazards we might have around us with other pieces of equipment or
other people, we need to be seen so high. This is kind of
becoming a standard piece of PPE for chainsaw operation as well.


Peter Koch: And so you're talking about the high
vis vests or whoever's clothing so that [00:29:00] you're able to
be seen better by from a distance, whether it be with the crew
that you're working with, which I think is pretty key, too, so
that they can recognize you. But certainly if you're working in a
public space, which a lot of ancillary chainsaw use happens in
that the public can notice that there's something going on there
as well so that whoever's clothing makes you more visible for
sure.


Andy Wood: Some of the injuries that we see are
someone working with a chainsaw or another tool and creating a
hazard for someone else who wanders into their work area. So it's
important that at least all the people that are working with you,
you can look up and identify them easily before, for example, if
you're dropping a tree, when you get ready to release that tree,
you need to be able to glance out real quick and see that there
is nobody in the drop zone.


Peter Koch: Yeah, it's pretty funny. You
mentioned that you and I have done some trainings before with
different resorts and we're off in the woods in a place that's
relatively unpopulated, but the resorts open to the public and
it's in the spring or summer time where people are wandering
around and you had a bunch of people around with chainsaws, were
dropping trees, and then all of a sudden [00:30:00] out of the
corner of your eye, as we're preparing to drop the tree, you see
someone with a dog that just hiked up the trail and they're
curious to see what's going on in there right in your work zone.
If you are in high viz and your team is in high viz, you can
easily see the people that are working with you, but you don't
always see the folks that are coming up to see what's happening
in your area. When we talk about personal protective equipment,
making sure that what you use indoors is in serviceable condition
is pretty key in making sure it meets the standard is is pretty
critical. But where we find a lot of failure on PPE is after it's
been purchased and been used for a while and for a number of
years, that it doesn't stay in good condition, not in serviceable
condition. What's the problem with that? Why shouldn't you use a
piece of PPE that's not in serviceable condition?


Andy Wood: Right. So, yeah, you're absolutely
right. Nothing lasts forever as much as we would like it to. One
of the things I do is I talk people out of gear that they're
wearing that I assume is no longer in serviceable condition. And
[00:31:00] sometimes I'll test it myself. And sometimes, you
know, I've taken a pair of chaps off, someone put it on a log and
just sort it right into pieces. You know, it didn't slow the
chainsaw down at all. And when the group sits there and watches
that and they realize, wow, that looked like those are chaps and
those were designed to be run with a chainsaw. But there we
didn't stop to think that they're no longer in serviceable
condition. They're just too old. They're matted down with grease
and oil or pitch or they've been cut into. So we want to know
that the gear that we have can be expected to perform the way it
was intended to. So there's a lot of things, whether it's hard
hat or chaps are going to take it out. Serviceable condition if
it's below that standard. And you continue to use it, you're not
going to get the level of protection that you're expecting and
realize that nothing is going to stop all the injuries anyways.
And if you're starting with something that, you know is
compromised, you're just kind of starting with the, you know, one
foot in the hole already.


Peter Koch: Yeah, that's a really good point. So
the industry standards the ANSI standard or, you know, listing
[00:32:00] for your equipment states that this piece of PPE meets
a minimum standard, whether it's a cut through standard for your
resistance or it's a penetration standard for your helmet or your
eyeglasses. So there's a minimum there. And like you said, no
piece of PPE will protect you from everything. So when you start
with a piece of personal protective equipment, that's meets a
minimum standard and now you've brought it below the minimum
standard through poor maintenance or poor storage or it's been
damaged and has protected you once before and now you're putting
it back into use again. It's not going to protect you in the same
method or same manner. So there's a higher chance that your
mistake or your engagement in the hazard is going to cause a
bigger injury for you later on if your PPE not in good shape.


Andy Wood: And most of the PPE that we have is
designed for, you know, it can take one hit, whether it's a hard
hat or are leg protection. You know, it's only designed 
[00:33:00]fall protection. You know, once you put that to the
ultimate test, it really needs to come out of service or needs to
be inspected by someone who's qualified to determine whether it's
in service condition, the condition of those your PPE changes
every day. So it's important that you start every day with an
evaluation of the gear that you have your PPE or chainsaw or any
of your equipment to make sure it's going to perform as expected.


Peter Koch: Perfect. So if you find that it's
not in serviceable condition, doesn't meet the standards that the
manufacturer sets out for you, which is right on those
instructions, pull it out of service and get a new set, even
though it might take you a little bit more time to get going in
the morning or in the afternoon or get your project going. It's
beneficial for you to have a proper piece of PPE.


Andy Wood: And I would say just good inspection
process can usually predict, you know, the life of a piece of
equipment so you can get some spare chaps so you can get a new
screen for your hard hat ahead of time. So when you look at that
in the morning and finally says, OK, it's not in serviceable
condition anymore, you've got some replacement gear ready to
ready to roll.


Peter Koch: That's a really [00:34:00] good
point, to have some spares with you so that inevitably the PPE
just won't be in shape. So let's talk a little bit about chain
saws. So we've moved in the control hierarchy where we're going
from PPE, but we need to consider the condition of the saw itself
before we go and put that saw in a piece of wood. So what are
some of the things that we need to look for in a saw to make sure
that it's appropriate to run that day?


Andy Wood: So, of course, the manufacturer in
the owner's manual is going to set out standards. The specifics
that you need to look for every day, you know, the chainsaw
should be in good condition for all the different parts. There
are three particularly that are kind of unique to a chainsaw that
we look at. These are in the OSHA standard that we're going to
look at every day. And that would be the chain break, the chain
catch, which is if the chain is broken or thrown off the bar,
it's going to minimize the travel distance, hopefully to prevent
that chain from being shot off to injure someone else or hitting
you. And then the throttle lock, the way the throttle lock works,
it just prevents the  [00:35:00]saw from being accelerated
unless you have a full grip on the saw. Before we had the
throttle lock person walking through the woods with a chainsaw
walking through heavy brush, the brush could hit the throttle and
it could accelerate it and people would be cut in the legs. Now
we have the throttle interlock, so it's a lot safer to use. So
those need to be confirmed every day. And again, in your owner's
manual, it tells you how to test them. Some of them it's breezy,
some of them you have to know a little bit about how they work to
test them. So those three need to be confirmed every day because
they are wear items and they don't last forever. In addition to
the those three, you know, obviously the you know, the on off
switch and the guarding, you know, that covers the flywheel and
the chain sprocket, those should all be intact. The other big
one, and this is probably the most challenging for everybody,
because it's hard to figure out. There's only a handful of people
that are naturals that can manage it well and it changes every
cut you make. This could change. And that is the condition of the
chain. Yeah, the sharpness of the chain you've all heard over and
over again. [00:36:00] It doesn't matter if it's an axe or, you
know, any cutting tool. If it's not sharp, it's dangerous to be
with. And the chainsaw can get dull very quickly if it comes in
contact with even, you know, just wood that's got a little dirt
on it. Or heaven forbid, you know, you hit a rock, hit it in the
ground, what you're going to do or occasionally hit a piece of
steel that's going to take the saw out of serviceable condition.
And you need to have the skill, you know, to get that back first
to recognize that it should not go out of the, you know, leave
the shop in the morning because it's just going to frustrate you
when you get into the field with it. That's an art in itself,
sharpening whether you decide to handle yourself or use a guide
or just take the train back to the shop and have them do it. Or
if you're a bigger facility, maybe someone in-house can manage
sharpening just to recognize that it's not in serviceable
condition. And stop right there, get another chain sharpen that
chain get another sore or go to plan B, because taking a tool
that's not in serviceable condition into the field is not going
to work well. [00:37:00]


Peter Koch: So that's interesting. The three
safety features of the saw the throttle lock, the chain break and
the chain catch itself were features that I realize were there.
And then I learned that they're actually required from the OSHA
standard to have on the saws. So that made sense. The big aha
moment for me was sharpening and how sharpening affects not just
the productivity, but it effects the cut itself, the quality of
the cut. It affects your ability as a as a sawyer to maintain
good posture all day and less have less fatigue as you go
through.


Andy Wood: I like to say that, you know, a dull
chain will make you hot in the summer and cold in the winter. You
know, it's a game you just can't win. And you're absolutely
right. Looking at that before you leave the shop, that's your
best chance to have good falling conditions. You know, I think
filing there's only a handful of people that I've ever run into
that were just naturals for that. You know, it's kind of like
being an artist. You know, I can barely make a stick figure that
people [00:38:00] could recognize. Same thing. There's some
people that are naturals at filing and the rest of us all are
going to struggle with that. So having as much in our favor as we
can in a shop, you've got a to hold the all. You've got good
lighting. If you're on a ski area and you take that saw, you go
to the far corners of the property and it turns out to be dull.
You're going to be frustrated. You're going to have to sit down
and sharpen their you know cold wind is blowing down your neck.
In the summer the black flies are chewing on your ears. It's just
not a good chance to really have good results sharpening. So if
you look at it in the morning, you can use the you can either you
might have a sharp chain or a new chain in the shop, but you have
conditions that, you know, facilitate quality sharpening.


Peter Koch: Yeah, it's a really good point. So
chainsaw condition overall, making sure that the three safety
features are there. Other parts of the saw are actually in shape
and working appropriately. And then a good sharp chain are all
things that should be checked prior to going out and will help
manage the hazards that you have. Because like you said, a dull
chain or a [00:39:00] dull saw or an improperly running saw is
just going to cause you problems down the road.


Andy Wood: And in fact, we encourage people to
take sharp chains, spare sharp chains with them depending on the
conditions. It's easy to go dull during the day. And if you know,
if it just goes a little bit dull, maybe you can touch it up in
the field. But if you hit anything, if you hit the dirt, hit a
rock or pieces steel further ahead from a production standpoint
and a safety standpoint to swap on a sharp chain and get right
back into a production mode and take that back to the garage,
some rainy afternoon and work on it back there.


Peter Koch: Yeah, it's a good point. And
sometimes you don't know it for all your experience. I remember
one time we were doing a training at a ski area. We actually just
felled the tree and we were going to take the stump down. And
when we cut into that stump, we actually cut into a rock that the
tree had grown around. So it's not even something that you could
possibly predict. But in that case, if you didn't have a spare
change, you'd spend a half an hour, an hour sharpening that chain
because [00:40:00] of all the damage that got done to it just by
a second or two touch as you came into that tree. Remember that
pretty specific and that. But you weren't happy about that day


Andy Wood:  In that specific case I'm not
sure that chain ever got sharpened again because there's a
limitation, you know, what you can do and some chains are
actually going to get completely destroyed. That might have been
one that never got sharpened again.


Peter Koch: Probably did. It might show up in
one of our trainings again at some point in time. Hey, so let's
move on a little bit. We've talked about PPE. We've talked about
chain saws. Both are. Things like the PPE will help you in the
event of a mistake, when you engage the hazard, a good saw will
help reduce the possibility of being exposed or getting injured
if you have a well maintained saw. But let's talk a little bit
about what else can be done to help prevent an injury. So like we
discussed work zones a little bit. Can you elaborate a little bit
more about what a work zone is and why it's important to set
those up at the beginning of your cut?


Andy Wood: Managing your work zone is really
critical. I think we've seen [00:41:00] more injuries with our
non-loggers, a little different environment. They're working and
they tend to work with other people. You mentioned the ski areas.
There's a lot going on there in areas where there's a lot of
other people in logging your work zone. If you're felling a tree,
usually a logger is often in the woods by himself or he's with
one other person who's driving the skitter. So it's easier to
manage that work zone. In that case, the work zone is two tree
lengths. So you need to manage everybody who could be within two
tree lengths and back in the woods, there's usually nobody in the
woods, so you don't have to worry about it quite as much except
for when you're skitter operator comes back, you'll have to look
out for him. But at the ski areas or the campgrounds, there's a
lot of people around or the you know, the power companies, when
there's storm damage, there's a lot of people around. It's
important that you manage every, you know, anybody that could be
impacted by what you're doing. So we've seen with the occasional
users a lot more situations where there's going to be groups of
people working together and maybe one will have a chainsaw or
sometimes two. And, you know, we've [00:42:00] seen the same
thing with brush saws. People get too close to each other. You
need to look at your work zone for tree felling. OSHA Standards
is defined. It's two tree lengths for everything else. The OSHA
standard has a paragraph that says, basically, you need to
consider if the worst case scenario happens, you need to consider
how big of an area could you impact. And you need to manage
everybody in that area or preferably just get them out in. The
best option is always to get them out. Now, some jobs, there
might be someone in your work zone, but they need to be paying
attention to what you're doing. You can't have two people in the
same work zone doing two different things. So look at what the
hazard might be if you're cutting a tree, obviously, the tree
could fall. And the reason for the two tree lengths is and we've
actually had a fatality with this, a tree could hit a dead tree
out at three quarters of its length and then the dead tree falls
over. And so you're getting to tree lengths away from where you
start. If you're cutting wood and someone puts a pile of
[00:43:00] tree like firewood in your front yard or you're
bucking it up for the condos at the ski area, you know, the
hazard might be you start to buck up that firewood and you get to
a certain balanced point on the log pile and the log rolls down
the pile as the center of gravity shifts. So who else is around
that pile? Does the log fall down the front of the pile towards
you or does it fall down the back of the pile where there may be
someone else also running a chainsaw? So you need to look at that
storm damage wood. There's a lot of energy in those trees that
come down with storms. So and sometimes they're being supported
by other trees or power lines are still in the play. Even if the
power's gone, there's a lot of energy in there. So when you make
those cuts, what's going to happen to that? Wood is going to get
thrown up or down and look what can happen sometimes for a
chainsaw. Other people have been hit with kickback, right? So
sometimes if you're just cutting a piece of wood on the ground,
the only thing that's going to happen is an 18 inch block of wood
is going to fall to the ground. You're thinking, well, there's
not much of a hazard there. And I would agree with you as far as
the [00:44:00] piece that you're cutting. But if you have a
kickback, a chainsaw can be, you know, thrown out of your hands,
back behind you. That may be the best case scenario. If it
doesn't hit you, it can go, you know, 15, you know, 20 feet away
from you. So even then and we've had people cut with brush saws
as well, same thing. Kick back of a brush, saw, you know, cuts in
into someone who was working right next to that person.


Peter Koch: Yeah. And those work zones can be
changing. You talked about brush saws. So if you if you got two
or three people working in a particular area, mowing or basically
weeding down through a particular space, if you don't maintain
the same distance of your work zone from when you start to when
you finish, especially if there's a funneling effect of the
property that you're on, when you get down towards the bottom,
you may be within that circular space of the brush saw swing as
you go back and forth. And if you're not paying attention to
that, you could easily swing in to the guy or gal that you're
working next to. And the same thing even with working with your
[00:45:00] chainsaw wood on the pile. As the pile gets bigger,
you're adding wood to it as you go or the pile gets smaller. That
work zone might actually change. Or if there's more people that
are going to come into that particular space.


Andy Wood: And it is a changing environment and
you have to keep track again who's in your work zone. This
happened a couple of years ago. We had a person was living and
they got their saw pinched. OK, so that that'll happen to you
occasionally. Sometimes you can go and pull on the limb a little
bit. This was a big hardwood top. Sometimes you can go and pull
on the limb. It'll take the pressure off the bar, the saw, so
it'll come out of the same curve. So one person was pulling on
the saw to try and get it out of the saw curve and his buddy saw
what was happening and thought, well, I can go and pull on the
top a little bit and it'll relieve the pressure on the, on the
bar and he can get it out. So he comes walking right into the
work zone unbeknownst to the person who's pulling on the saw.
Just as this person walks by him, the saw comes out of the saw
curve, he's got a death grip on the hand. So it accelerates
[00:46:00] to full throttle. And the force of him pulling it back
causes the sort to swing by and hit his buddy in the leg. That's
coming to help him. Kind of a different scenario, but you need to
keep track of, you know, before anyone comes in that war zone,
the side needs to be shut off. So, you know, nothing's going to
happen. I had one last year on a arborists site person was
running a chainsaw. Again, arborists tend to work, you know, in
the front yard where there's multiple people in a small area
person turned around with his chainsaw still turning and sawed
the person next to him right in the buttocks. So, yeah, you got
to manage who's going to be around you and how big of an area you
could have an impact in.


Peter Koch: And I think that's an important
lesson to learn. That knowledge of the work zone isn't just it's
not established by just the sawyer or the person working the saw,
but the people around you who are working with you need to
understand that work zone, too, so that when you come into that
space, if this is the no go space that you need to have eye
contact with the operator and that  [00:47:00]saw needs to
be in a safe position before you come in to engage in that space.
Otherwise, the person using the saw doesn't know where you are or
might not know where you are as they start to make a particular
maneuver. Not you're not always going to pay attention to the
people around you if you get focused completely on the work that
you're doing. And it's unfortunate, but that's really human
nature. We're going to forget sometimes some of the things that
occur, especially if the saw gets stuck and you're feeling a
little anxious about getting the work done or whatever is going
to happen. So for sure, you need to make sure everybody knows
what that work zone is. And the people working with you need to
understand that too.


Andy Wood: Right so much of what we do in these
non production situations. It is a team activity. Someone's
cutting brush, someone's lugging the brush off into a brush pile.
They're lugging it to a chipper. You're cutting firewood and
somebody's taking the blocks over to, you know, cutting the and
pile. So, yeah, there's going to be people all around you. So
just a little bit of a game plan before you start to [00:48:00]
figure out how that's going to proceed.


Peter Koch: Perfect. So then before we talk
about training, which is really the last piece of this, let's
talk briefly about what happens if an injury occurs. So you talk
about EMS first aid, so talk a little bit about that. What's
required for the saw operator from a first aid standpoint? And
then what are some other considerations that if you're going to
be working in the field with the chainsaw, you should have about
injury management and EMS contact?


Andy Wood: I guess the first thing I'd say is we
look at first aid is it's not safety, you know, it's after you
have an injury. It doesn't improve work behaviors and eliminate
hazards, but it does help manage the injury afterwards. Important
to have. So most of the standards out there require basic first
aid and CPR, the OSHA logging standard. If you want to follow
that one, all employees are going to have basic first aid and
CPR. If you want to follow the arborists standard, if you're
working, removing trees and developed areas. Same thing there.
People have to have a knowledge [00:49:00] based on the hazards
type of injuries you have, which are going to be big because
they're going to be chainsaw cuts and struck by falling objects.
So the standard lays out they have a very specific curriculum
that has to be followed for those traumatic injuries. So your
basic 8 hour first aid, CPR programs are going to cover that. The
one thing I find interesting about the first aid is I don't think
a lot of the certification cycles are two years. So I have to
take that every couple of years. I have yet to go to one of those
first aid trainings as a researcher and not have someone in the
class tell a story about when they used the first aid training
that they've got. Usually it's with their family and their kids,
but it's once you get that knowledge, it's not heavy to carry
around. You know, it stays in your head. And hopefully when you
need that, it'll come back and help you quite a bit. So basic
first aid training is part of the equation.


Peter Koch: What about a first aid kit?


Andy Wood: Yeah, I think the thing about first
aid is you have to realize that a lot of places you're going to
use it, you know, some of the first aid training, you're based on
being three to five minutes from [00:50:00] advanced medical
services. But most places you're using a chainsaw, a ski area,
you're back on the back corner of the ski area or even a big
college campus. You're for the first five minutes, you're on your
own or you and your buddy. So important that someone right there,
you know, or even prepared,


Peter Koch: Even in rural spaces. Look at some
of the communities around where I live in. You know, EMS is not
five minutes away. You're talking 10, 15, sometimes 20 minutes,
depending on where they're coming from. And the first response is
going to be a volunteer response. And then the second response is
going to be your EMS with the truck. I had story. My wife was
driving home one day on our road and our neighbor, like a mile
away from us, was laying in his driveway just and that's not a
normal thing for him. And what had happened was he had been
cutting wood in the fire, in the woodpile across the street in
his woodlot, and he had cut himself in the arm with the chainsaw.
And [00:51:00] he had managed to stumble all the way across the
street, knock on the door to get his wife's attention. And then
he passed out in the driveway. And my wife so his wife was
actually on the phone with the EMS while my wife drove past to
provide some first aid. And without the two together, he wouldn't
have survived. So it just goes to show you that even though you
think first aid might be that 911 call away, we're so used to
that instantaneous response where you are, that might not be the
reality. So you have to be able to provide for yourself with
people that have good first aid training to start with, but then
they have to have the right supplies with them in order for that
to happen. So what's required for a first aid kit?


Peter Koch: Sure. Again, if you look at the OSHA
logging standard, there's a specific list. The Appendix B is
going to tell you exactly what you have to have in there. The
arborist standard has a similar thing. I don't care if you had a
ski area or a campground. I'd suggest you look at, you know, look
at those lists and see what's on them. And the biggest thing and
[00:52:00] again, it has to be in serviceable condition anything
that's medicated, you know, the expiration date as stay dry and
clean with a chainsaw. The big thing that you need that is not
going to be in any of your standard first aide kits is large
trauma pads. So you need some blood, something blood stopping.
The kind of wound that you get from a chainsaw is not a small cut
that's going to be put back together with band aids and four by
four gauze and some, you know, butterfly bandages. It's going to
leave a gaping wound. So you need something that's really large,
really large trauma pads, something to put pressure on there
with. So roll or gauze or ace bandage and definitely a
tourniquet. So for years we didn't talk about Tunicates. You
know, they're back on the table. And I think they're a lifesaver.
If you look at the type of injuries you're going to see about the
only injury that you're going to treat yourself on the spot or
you're going to die is blood loss. Most of the rest of the
injuries, you know, you're not going to splint a leg in the field
very often. Usually you're going to call the EMS [00:53:00] and
they're going to look at it. A lot of the injuries, there's not
much you're going to do other than package and comfort a person.
Blood loss is something if you don't deal with that right on the
spot, a person could be dead in two or three minutes. So having,
you know, the training, but also having in the first aid kit some
large trauma beds that are not left on the four wheeler or in the
pickup as you continue to walk two or three or four hundred yards
away from where you left your vehicle. The trauma pads need to go
with you in the field. I say they should. No further than your
fuel can, I'm assuming that you're fueling up multiple times and
you don't get too far from it and a lot of them are made to be
worn right on a belt. I have a tool belt that has a space for one
blood stopper are right on it.


Peter Koch: Yeah. And that might be the
difference between saving your life, even if you can do your own
first aid or the person working with you can do first aid on if
you have it on you or have it right with you, that's the best
option. Because if you're two or three minutes away and it's only
going to take you two, three minutes to bleed out, you're three
minutes from providing that [00:54:00] proper first aid to the
person who actually needs it. So great advice to have the right
training, have the right kit and then have that kit with you. And
then the last part of this is access to EMS and making sure that
your communication device is going to work no matter where you
are. So if your plan is to be way out in the woods somewhere and
your plan to access nine one, one is to use your buddy cell
phone, make sure you got enough bars to get out to nine one.


Andy Wood: Yeah, we have a lot of places still
in Maine that don't have 911 one, you know, ski areas. You just
get behind a mountain somewhere and you could you could lose that
option. So, yeah, a little bit of plan, whether you have cell
service or whether you have radios, who's going to help you who
own property. If you're on a big property, who can you call in
immediately to help with evacuation? And then as far as the EMS,
you have two scenarios. We generally look at there. One, where
you're going to stabilize the person and take them to a trauma
center. So where's the nearest emergency room you would take them
to? And the other is where you have an injury, [00:55:00] you
know, suspected head neck spine where you don't want to move
them. You're going to leave them on site and have the help come
to them. So you need to kind of look at that in both ways. Are
you going to take a person to a trauma center or are you going to
stabilize the person and have EMS come to you?


Peter Koch: Yeah, perfect. OK, so we've talked
about PPE, we've talked about chainsaw use, we talked about work
zones. We've talked about the aftermath. Not so much a safety
piece, but a survival piece from an EMS standpoint. So let's
finally talk about before we close here, let's talk about
training and what might be you know, why is training important
and what do people need to actually be competent with a saw?


Andy Wood: Yeah. So there's no question training
is the biggest piece of this. You know, I had a colleague, a
fellow trainer who used to say, if you have good felling skills
and you manage your hazards, you could cut wood in a Speedo and
be safe. Not that I would encourage that.


Peter Koch: I don't want to see that


Andy Wood: it's a scary thought. But if you
think about it, most of the injuries that we see are the result
of workplace practices. And [00:56:00] you know what cutting
method they were using decisions the person is making through the
process. Not so much always a gear failure or something like
that. So the training we adapted early on a formal training
program. It was an international training program. It became
known as game of Logging. It's probably the most recognized
training program, you know, nationwide. It's got standardization
of courses, instructor certification. And there's really only a
couple that are recognized nationwide that in the one the Forest
Service, the government uses for their woodland firefighters. And
then there's a lot of spinoffs from that. So I would suggest, you
know, you do a little research and find out who's offering the
training. You know, that they've got some experience doing the
training, but have a good program that works well and the
training that we use game of logging. It was a Swedish labor
consultant, actually a production woodcutter in his younger days,
Soren Ericsson developed the training. He developed [00:57:00]
the training not to be safe. The goal was to put more wood in the
pile at the end of the day with less effort. And over time,
people realized that the people who are cutting the most wood
also were the people who weren't going to the hospital very
often. So eventually it got misinterpreted as safety training,
although it was really solely in the early days production
training. And what we found out, as we pretty much found in most
safety issues, you know, job quality, personal safety and
productivity really can't be separated. They all three go
together.


Peter Koch: So with the training part where we
have a training, if we're looking at if I'm looking to provide
some training to my staff, I want to make sure that it's going to
be recognized that it's going to cover personal protective
equipment, that there's going to be some you're going to have
some hands on part two because you can't learn how to use the
chainsaw from a PowerPoint presentation in a classroom someplace.
So it'll give you some basics. But you really have to translate
that information back to a [00:58:00] return demonstration of
skills so that the instructor can see what you're doing. And
that's one of the benefits, I think, of the training that we do
is that it combines both it has some didactic back and forth,
some classroom to talk about the parts of the tooth and the
mechanics of the stump and why it works. But then we take them
out to the field to show how those things actually work together.
And those were the real aha moments when I can think about what
you talked about in the classroom from the mechanics of the stump
and how every cut that happens first, the next cut is referenced
off the cut prior to that. And if you make a mistake right in the
beginning, whether it's information that you took that you took
that was incorrect or you were off in your angles, then
everything from that is going to be off a little bit unless you
stop to correct it and you only have so many opportunities to
correct it before you possibly have a catastrophic failure from
the mistake. So looking at all those are important. One thing
that you say frequently [00:59:00] is that no matter what
training we do and how many days that we spend training is that
training is not going to make you a chainsaw operator or it's not
going to make you even a better chainsaw operator to change the
training by itself. What has to happen in order for that training
to translate into good work practices?


Andy Wood: Right so when I'm having a
conversation about training with people in industry and you know
what training they want to do and what their goals are, I say if
you look at the training on a scale of zero to 10 zero being
where you're at and 10 being, you know, full compliance, exactly
where you'd like to be training alone will get you to one, you
know, maybe one and a half really good training. You might get to
two, really. It's all about follow up and commitment to
practicing those things that you learn to develop that into kind
of a subconscious behavior for yourself. So the training in
itself, it's kind of like learning how to read or, you know,
you're going to start with the alphabet, but [01:00:00] that's
really not going to get you anywhere in itself. You got to put
that all together and get all the pieces together, the training
that we do. You mentioned the hands on nature. The training that
we do is all in the woods. It's in small groups. You know,
there's a discussion, there's a demonstration explanation of how
things work and then there's a return. Everyone will take a turn
at that and they'll do explain whether it's how the Sawtooth
works or what their plan is for failing. Then they'll partake and
you'll do an evaluation. So it's something that while there's a
lot of good information, you know, on the Internet, we use that
as review for the training, the training, really, we like to put
out there and a hands Hands-On format in small groups right in
the field to begin with.


Peter Koch: That's awesome. So we've reached
about the end of today's podcast. And I think we're going to have
you on again, Andy, to talk about some more of those specifics
about the saw and maybe even some more about the training and
what people can do to make their chainsaw safety process more
robust. But I really wanted to thank you for sharing your
expertise with us today. [01:01:00] So I appreciate that having
you on today.


Andy Wood: Sure it's been great. Hopefully the
listeners will get something out of it.


Peter Koch: I imagine they will. So, again,
thanks again for joining us. And to all of our listeners out
there for spending some time with us today. If you've got a
chainsaw project or you've got a property clearing project, it's
best if you start with looking at not internally, but look
outside and contract, because there are professionals out there
that have the training, that have the tools, that have the
expertise to be much more efficient at managing some of those
property cleanup projects that you have. So that's always a good
place to start, even though we've talked about a lot of controls
here on the podcast today, looking outside to a professional to
come in might be your best bet. So today, we've been talking with
Andy Wood safety management consultant here at MEMIC. And if you
would like more information on chainsaw safety or would like to
hear more about our particular topic on our podcast, e-mail me at
podcast@MEMIC.com. Also check out our show notes at
MEMIC.com/podcast, [01:02:00] where you can find links to
resources. For a deeper dive into this topic, check out our Web
site at MEMIC.com/podcast where you can find our podcast archive.
And while you're there, sign up for our Safety Net blog so you
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this is Peter Koch reminding you that listening to the MEMIC
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is even better.