The Far West Cedar Mill: Dangerous

    In 1978 when I took a job at the Far West Cedar Mill in McBride, it didn’t take me long to see what a dangerous work place it was.  My job drilling the holes in the cedar fence posts was safe.   I only had to lug the fence posts onto the drilling machine and move a lever to lower the drills, then put the fence post in a bin, but some of the other jobs in the mill were very dangerous, especially the jobs splitting the logs.   (Photos)

    The logs would be man-handled onto the splitting machine, then operator using his hands, would hold the log in place.  He would hit a lever with his hip and that would cause a large metal blade to come sliding down the log spitting it while it was being held.  

    If you look at the photo above, you can see the upright blade nearing his hands.  While I was employed at Far West, many a finger was lost by a splitting machine operator.  I could never understand why BC’s Worker’s Compensation didn’t shut the place down.  One time a worker lost his whole hand.   

   Not only did the splitters have to be extremely careful with where their hands were, but they also had to be quick if the splitter blade hit a hard knot in the wood causing a large piece of cedar to fly up into the air. 

    Splitting was a crazy-dangerous job.  Several times, when splitter operators failed to show up for work, I was asked to do the job.  I always refused.  It was just too dangerous.

    Once a worker who had lost some fingers, after his time off to heal up, returned to the job; something that is hard to believe.

    While I was very careful about keeping myself safe, I did finally have my accident at Far West.  Part of my job was to climb up on a bundle of finished fence posts to bind them together for shipping.  One day we were out of the regular 1 inch wide steel steel strapping that I used to synch up the bundle.  I told the foreman and he then gave me some narrower strapping, telling me it was just as strong as would work.  

    The foreman was wrong. 

    As I stood, bent over on top of a bundle of logs, cranking and pulling hard on the gadget’s lever to tighten the strapping, the narrower strapping suddenly broke, causing me to lose my balance and fall four feet to the cement floor below.  I put out my arm to break my fall and broke my right wrist.  

    Unlike the other Far West worker I mentioned, when I healed up, I didn’t return to work there.  Luckily, I was able to begin working for the Forest Service, a job I held for 25 years, and loved.

    

See my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca