HO Ho HO Santa Hood

RustyACE

RustyACE

President CHDCA
The following is a true story and was posted by one of our members...

Well Rusty Here It is ........

I just had a big customer give me a chance to service their account and I needed everything to go good. I showed up at 11pm to start my night. I walked in to a mang. who was happy to see me as he wanted to go home for the night. I greeted him and started to get set up. He said that he had a couple things to do before he could go home and he disappeared into a office. WELL i had my plastic up and all my chemical sprayed so up to the fans i went. I had removed the fans and was comming down off the roof when i noticed the mang. driving away. I went to the door and YES it was locked. NO cell phone as it was inside. Well with all the doors locked and no way to get in i mad a B A D choice and decided to slide down the duct work. Well to shorten this story I got stuck and after 1hr inside this greasy death trap i popped out the bottom of the duct work---greasy, mad and burned(chemical). I stripped off every last pcs of clothing Yes even my underwear and began to scrub my body. I then went out to the truck(glad it was dark) and put on spare cloths that i had in the truck. the rest of the night went allright and the job got done. I drove home knowing that I had jusst done the DUmbest thing i had ever done. I call the customer and informed him of what had happened the night before and he started to laugh. Unknown to me there was a camara in the kitchen and he had seen the whole thing. He said that the tape has been recorded over and i hope he is tell the truth as i would hate to see my self in the buff on some " dumbest Employee" show.

the moral to this story DONT EVEN THINK OF GOING DOWN THE DUCT WORK LEAVE THAT FOR SANTA


Rusty
 
Pretty funny - but after a moment it became less humorous. It seems this fellow missed a few cardinal rules - more important and apart from not sliding down ducts!

(1) Always - ALWAYS obtain cell & home numbers of shift manager and always keep your cell phone in your pocket.

(2) Never go on a job all by yourself.


Why would this guy apply chemical to hood/plenum and then go on roof to tip fans? Very easy to get a facefull of chem mist which escapes from the duct - sometimes forcefully. He is very, very lucky not to have gotten even one drop of chem in an eye. In one hour he would probably lose his sight - I know. I would advise to always carry eyewash in a pocket. There are a number of ways to get stranded on a roof (inside hatch blows shut; ladder becomes unstable; overspray hits alum ladder & freezes; etc). There are so many ways to get hurt in this business it would behoove this fellow to spend some time with someone who really knows what he is doing.

Richard
 
Perhaps, but are you sure? All that mentioned are valuable safety items for a novice - as well as seasoned veterans.
Richard
 
To all those who have no since of humor.

There are obvious safety flaws. The particular hood cleaner has been cleaning hoods for 1 1/2 years.

The story wouldn't have been funny if he had gotten hurt or didn't end the way it did.

I posted the story (and it really did happen) to be humurous and for those that might try the same TO NOT DO IT!

Obviously people are people and you can't tell me that there hasn't been at least one person reading this story that hasn't thought at least once in their hood cleaning career "I wonder if I could get down that hole."

Take it from this guy's experience DON'T DO IT.


Rusty
 
Follow up:

"i made the story short by leaving out that the reason i got stuck is that my pant leg got stuck on the sprinkler head and pulled it up to my knee so i tried to rip my pants on the sprinkler to no luck. I ended up bending the pipe down ( thank god it didnt break ) and thats how i got out and yes i dont like tight spots either. I haad to tell myself many times to calm down and breathe, which was hard in thaat the fit was so tight. I did have a rope going down to me but there was no way of pulling myself out anyway."

and

"I forgot to explaine the cell phone.

I insulate and sheetrock on my off time and while working at a customers house i placed my phone on a window ledge and began to work. About a hr went by when i made another trip out to get some more supplys when i noticed one of the home owners dog chewing on somthing ---yep you gessed it there was my celll phone -it was a loss. I had to buy a new one. My wiffe works for a LARGE cell phone company so she bought me another phone that is their top of the line phone and cost more than my first car. Afraid of recking it I left it inside. I dont care if it cost 1 million if the thing isnt with you it isnt going to do much good."
 
The first thing that we train our people is to secure the door with tool box. When the door shut you know what happen, similar to locking you key in the car and knowing the second it locks.

One of our manager was locked out so he went to the roof and detached the roof hatch & then he re secured the store.

We had a manager once working on the fans and some idiot stole his ladder. Was unable to get down until a second crew showed up .
 
Does anyone make a strap that goes from the inside doorknob to the outside knob, keeping the door from closing on the latch? I have often thought that would be a money maker. I would buy a dozen.

I had a ladder stolen once when I was on the roof. The kids who took it just layed it on the sidewalk, thinking the person on the roof was a friend of thiers who was employed at the resurant. I explained how I was charging $100.00 per hour per man, and I had 3 on the job, making it $300.00 an hour until I could resume my work. I told them that I was also going to call the cops and press felony charges. Those kids did a fine job of setting up the ladder and an even better job of aplogizing to me. They also stopped at the resturant the next day and apologized the the mgr and thier friend.

Another occasion, I was on a roof when the wind blew my ladder off. I was not sure how long I would have to wait for someone to come along and help me. While I was trying to decide if I was going to jump or not, the snow started. A metal roof, snow and the cold did not make for a good combination. I jumped, about 12 or 15 feet to the ground, into a scrubby pine bush. I set up the ladder and finished my work. but i did tie off the ladder.

Another time I had the ladder blow over. I already had the hose on the roof so I just wrapped the hose around a fan and rappelled down the building.

I have had the ladder slip on snow/ice twice.

Maybe I should get in the habit of tieing off my ladder as we were taught in the fire service, and as I tell my people.

RustyAce, did your trainee never notice that most ducts (assuming the diameter would allow entrance) have sprinklers, nozzles, piping, and detectors in them? You might tell him that the sprinkler piping is supposed to hold a 250 # fitter + tools and fittings before bending. the pipe he bent should have been 1 inch pipe.

The reason people on this board doubt you is because of our past experiences with you. You have a long way to go to prove yourself, and change our opinion of you. I hope you will stay the course, you could be a valuble asset to the trade.

Douglas Hicks
General Fire Equipment Co of Eastern Oregon, Inc
 
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Two years ago when Rusty was just starting out I received a call from one of my high end customer stating that one of my employees had helped himself with some sorbet(ice cream) out of the walk in. Well my next question was, how do you know? Grease paw prints all over the tray. What are you going to do. Well I sent him $25 bucks and put the employee a two week suspension. We were unable to find this subject and we replaced him. This guy was a old Prisom SC Johnson employee.

Well 1.5 years later he files for California Unemployment and was awarded. He was only with us for 2 months and was not one of my favorite people. I did a formal appeal and had my day on Friday. He wrote a very bad letter about me his employer. He made me sound like I was the key role in the Unforgiven.

In the letter he did mention the sorbet event but added that he was slashed with some toxic chemicals(in the mouth) and the only thing that he could find was the sorbet to relieve the pain.

On other points I won the case. The judge could not stop laughing.


:)
 
Dear Doug,

I appreciate your tentative vote of confidence and will try and stay the course.

You can't imagine how much time I devote to this industry pushing it forward.

Sometimes I feel like some guy you see on TV pulling a bus with his teeth or something. He pulls and pulls and pulls and nothing and then you see the slightest movement and next thing you know against all odds that son of a gun has it moving.

Rusty
 
The grin of a true GREASER!

Rusty
 
Doug
That strap you speak of is called a Bungy, works great with a piece of cardboard to keep the door latching. I'm like BASF, I don't MAKE the products you buy, I make them better.
 
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