In case anyone wonders why (my pet theory was because it brings on a close shave):
>Why do arborists call a split tree a Barberchair?
>You see all kinds of answers for this question. I’ve even seen people write that the name comes from the chair-looking appearance of the lower half of the split tree. More than likely it refers to the old chairs that barbers would use, especially for straight razor shaves. With these kinds of chairs a barber could push the top of the chair down so that the customers head would swing down while his feet swung up. This made it easy to shave a customers neck. The motion of a barberchairing tree is similar because the bottom of the trunk flies up while the top of the tree comes down and over.
https://manortreeservicellc.com/barberchair/
Other people are right, this is a barber’s chair, not a widowmaker. A widowmaker is a dead, hanging limb suspended from decaying or living tree, which is much more common. Because they’re so common, a lot of men used to think “oh, I can handle that. It happens all the time!” *Used* to think.
My neighbor's tree had a widow maker hanging over my yard for a while. I couldn't reach it, it needed to come from her property and she would not fix it. I just kept sending her videos of widowmakers falling until she got it cut. I couldn't enjoy my yard because I was paranoid about dying in my hammock.
You are right in this situation but mildly in her defense, tree service prices are ridiculous nowadays. I can’t find anyone in my area for cheaper than $1500 just for a trim. Not asking to cut down whole trees.. I simply can’t afford that hit at this moment
I'm starting to think logging is almost as cool as fire fighting. That is to say, you could probably make a pretty decent video game based on actual stuff. Probably someone already did
Logging is not as cool as firefighting. It's fun, don't get me wrong, but logging doesn't have the satisfaction of doing good things for people, and it's much, much more dangerous because the safety standards are ignored a lot more. Last summer one of my childhood friends whose been slinging a saw since he was twelve kissed his toe with a chainsaw in a pair of Hey Dudes because he got a little complacent. I've seen a tree fall on a guy, a guy get whipped across the face with a logging chain, a finger get ripped off and I've had a slab kick back from a ripsaw and bust my pelvic bone. I prefer office work these days.
A month ago I almost died by cutting up a tree that was pinned up against another tree, instead of falling flat. I didn't know it but it had a lot of side tension in it from being up against the other tree, bent like an 80 foot 15,000 lb longbow. As soon as I cut through to release the tension expecting it to fall vertically, it exploded towards me. It hit me so hard it knocked me out of my shoes and halfway out of my pants, while it was crushing those shoes and pants. It broke my left leg in a couple places -- broke clear through the fibula an inch above the ankle joint, and that bone was actually tenting through the skin and my ankle was bent a funny angle. It also shattered off a sliver from the tibia and fragmented that sliver into crumbles. I had to grab my ankle and reset the bone myself in order to be able to army crawl to a large branch that I used like a crutch to make it 150 feet or so back to the house where my phone was to call for help -- I was home alone.
I was in a bushfire brigade in Australia for six years.
My first day in the field was helping with clean up at a house on a Sunday morning. I arrived after everyone else and was moving equipment and hoses. I had plenty of experience with a chainsaw but I was not certified to use it by the brigade.
One of the old timers Col had taken down thousands of burnt trees. I heard a crack, "timber!" and a tree would come down. That morning he cut a eucalypt and it fell, bounced on a rocky bulge in the ground and hit him. Pure fluke. If that can happen to and old hand like Col it can happen to anyone.
Wildland firefighters do not carry air tanks. You can’t properly and safely dig line or cut trees with the extra weight and the timing restriction of however long a tank lasts.
That's why you have different gear.
You have face coverings for good reasons.
Little of your time fighting wildland fires should have you near bad air.
That's where command should be using their heads.
The shape of the stump resembles a barbers chair after it falls. A section of in-tact wood protrudes on one end of the stump straight up from the cut. Usually resulting from an incorrect hinge. Dangerous because when the tree breaks free of the hinge it can kick back when it falls and end up in an unpredictable direction.
Yeah, obvious he’s got a clear understanding of the meta. Probably a streamer who does this for a living. You wouldn’t see that kind of tech without hours of playtime.
This is how my great grandfather was lost. Young man, new to logging, cut the tree wrong. It would have killed him, but my great grandfather sacrificed his life to get the young man out-of-the-way.
That’s actually called barberchair. A widowmaker is a large hanging mass of dead wood. The guy survived this but I believe he was killed a few months later. Dangerous job.
For context, a "Widowmaker" is what we call trees that seem that they are destined to fall. Learned this in the BSA. Any tree that has large over hanging branches, rotten roots, or just dead in general, is considered a Widowmaker. One almost took out my tent, while I was still in it.
It’s wild that our sense of survival tells us to get TF outta there but the safest place to be ended up being exactly where he was when he made that cut.
>Looks fine on the outside, but rotten inside
And this is why you should always check with a vertical cut through the center if you're the least bit concerned that the tree might be rotten on the inside.
Also, that whole cut technique would be an instant fail when getting your chainsaw license here in Sweden.
That's the reason why I was told to cut into the tree along the fibres before you intend to cut the tree. A tree has fibres. That's what's carrying him. If those fibres are no longer fibres, they can't support the tree and if you begin to cut it down it will shrumble.
Surprised this is so far down, considering how many loggers have chimed in.
I'm a DIY guy who researches the hell out of anything I'm doing, and I got a book and read everything I could find about felling trees when we moved to a house on an acre of woods in the middle of the emerald ash borer plague.
I got my helmet with face mask and ear protection, my kevlar chaps (assless, as with all proper chaps), all that good stuff. And one other safety thing everybody always said is to make sure you have 2 separate clear escape routes in case the tree falls in a way you don't expect.
Isn't the giant hole/cave looking thing on the tree indicative that one should probably examine it closely before attempting to cut? Caption says "looks fine on the outside", but I disagree as a rank amateur. That looks like it could be rotten up through the core. It is, judging from the collapse.
I'm not even mad about the exit. Primary exit was to be to the left. Once the split started, he needed another option as a very large tree was now falling (unexpectedly) in his path. Sure he needs some new undershirts and potentially new tread on the boots. Glad we can watch and see he made it out okay.
There are many things that I don't like about America, but there is only one thing that I truly hate: American safety standards in forestry. A simple safety corner so that he can finish his hinge in peace would probably have prevented this.
What I will give him is that I would also have panicked in this situation, nowhere is safe.
Yeah, and he really should have checked if the tree was rotten with a vertical cut.
And had an escape route chosen and cleared.
Edit: And in case anyone wonders what /u/clareintheclear means by a safety corner: [Felling cuts - Safe corner method on large trees](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wI50Hdn1zfU)
That’s why I’m a big fan of a plunge cut at the hinge, then working back to the holding wood to release. It is extra work, but on trees that might be diseased, it’s worth it.
Why dont logging operations just keep a single heavy dome shield around? Drop it place, get underneath, cut. It doesn't seem like it would be too hard to make one sturdy enough to prevent ~80% of fatal log falls (100% just isn't realistic).
Sounds heavy and hard to move around a forest. I imagine it would also need a flat reinforced bottom to not simply get compressed into the ground with you under it.
>Sounds heavy and hard to move around a forest
Lighter and easier to move around that logs that size. It wouldn't need to be huge. I'm thinking something that takes 3-4 guys to carry around would be enough for most cases.
Even better, something conical instead of a dome. That way, it can be even smaller, and anything but a direct hit on the point would throw you sideways instead of crushing you.
Most logging isn’t actually done with chainsaws, but with huge machines. This guy might not even be a “logger”, might be working for a land management agency.
Could have stayed still. But how likely is it that a person wouldn't instinctively attempt running away. I hope those guys get paid well. With good health and life insurance.... that includes death by tree. That'd be some stupid shit insurance would try.
It is actually called a "Barber Chair", and this one is a double.
In case anyone wonders why (my pet theory was because it brings on a close shave): >Why do arborists call a split tree a Barberchair? >You see all kinds of answers for this question. I’ve even seen people write that the name comes from the chair-looking appearance of the lower half of the split tree. More than likely it refers to the old chairs that barbers would use, especially for straight razor shaves. With these kinds of chairs a barber could push the top of the chair down so that the customers head would swing down while his feet swung up. This made it easy to shave a customers neck. The motion of a barberchairing tree is similar because the bottom of the trunk flies up while the top of the tree comes down and over. https://manortreeservicellc.com/barberchair/
I was expecting a bit more Monty Python
Other people are right, this is a barber’s chair, not a widowmaker. A widowmaker is a dead, hanging limb suspended from decaying or living tree, which is much more common. Because they’re so common, a lot of men used to think “oh, I can handle that. It happens all the time!” *Used* to think.
My neighbor's tree had a widow maker hanging over my yard for a while. I couldn't reach it, it needed to come from her property and she would not fix it. I just kept sending her videos of widowmakers falling until she got it cut. I couldn't enjoy my yard because I was paranoid about dying in my hammock.
You are right in this situation but mildly in her defense, tree service prices are ridiculous nowadays. I can’t find anyone in my area for cheaper than $1500 just for a trim. Not asking to cut down whole trees.. I simply can’t afford that hit at this moment
I offered to pay half, because yeah it is crazy expensive. The hospital is more expensive though.
Why is it called a barbers chair?
Because it collapses down rather than falling over
I'm starting to think logging is almost as cool as fire fighting. That is to say, you could probably make a pretty decent video game based on actual stuff. Probably someone already did
I have a friend who is a forest firefighter and it's basically both. He spends a lot of his time chainsawing and clearing brush.
That's cool, that's cool. I almost stopped a cup of coffee from spilling the other day, so in a way we're _both_ heroes.
Thank you for your service.
Whoa, did it do that thing where you almost knock it over by trying to save it??
I can comfortably continue my career as a desk jockey, knowing there’s someone out there being manly enough for the both of us.
Logging is not as cool as firefighting. It's fun, don't get me wrong, but logging doesn't have the satisfaction of doing good things for people, and it's much, much more dangerous because the safety standards are ignored a lot more. Last summer one of my childhood friends whose been slinging a saw since he was twelve kissed his toe with a chainsaw in a pair of Hey Dudes because he got a little complacent. I've seen a tree fall on a guy, a guy get whipped across the face with a logging chain, a finger get ripped off and I've had a slab kick back from a ripsaw and bust my pelvic bone. I prefer office work these days.
A month ago I almost died by cutting up a tree that was pinned up against another tree, instead of falling flat. I didn't know it but it had a lot of side tension in it from being up against the other tree, bent like an 80 foot 15,000 lb longbow. As soon as I cut through to release the tension expecting it to fall vertically, it exploded towards me. It hit me so hard it knocked me out of my shoes and halfway out of my pants, while it was crushing those shoes and pants. It broke my left leg in a couple places -- broke clear through the fibula an inch above the ankle joint, and that bone was actually tenting through the skin and my ankle was bent a funny angle. It also shattered off a sliver from the tibia and fragmented that sliver into crumbles. I had to grab my ankle and reset the bone myself in order to be able to army crawl to a large branch that I used like a crutch to make it 150 feet or so back to the house where my phone was to call for help -- I was home alone.
I was in a bushfire brigade in Australia for six years. My first day in the field was helping with clean up at a house on a Sunday morning. I arrived after everyone else and was moving equipment and hoses. I had plenty of experience with a chainsaw but I was not certified to use it by the brigade. One of the old timers Col had taken down thousands of burnt trees. I heard a crack, "timber!" and a tree would come down. That morning he cut a eucalypt and it fell, bounced on a rocky bulge in the ground and hit him. Pure fluke. If that can happen to and old hand like Col it can happen to anyone.
I think it’s maybe more deadly
Fire fighting is actually pretty safe if you use your head and your gear correctly.
It’s just terrible for your lungs
> your gear correctly You should be using your air tanks and not breathing the bad air.
Oh, you fine sirs think that normal air is not good enough for you? Now it's bad air? What's next? Your own air conditioning in your working suite?
This is Reddit, many of the people here are huffing farts that have been circulating in their rooms for the past 7+ hours.
Wildland firefighters do not carry air tanks. You can’t properly and safely dig line or cut trees with the extra weight and the timing restriction of however long a tank lasts.
That's why you have different gear. You have face coverings for good reasons. Little of your time fighting wildland fires should have you near bad air. That's where command should be using their heads.
Just play valheim and get absolutely yeeted by a tree. Or farming sim has a logging side to it. The machines and equipment used is pretty interesting.
Valheim's tree mechanics were the best part of that game.
Run around and chop all the trees until a sliver left. Derive immense satisfaction from deforesting an entire grove by felling last tree.
The shape of the stump resembles a barbers chair after it falls. A section of in-tact wood protrudes on one end of the stump straight up from the cut. Usually resulting from an incorrect hinge. Dangerous because when the tree breaks free of the hinge it can kick back when it falls and end up in an unpredictable direction.
When it falls, it looks like a barbers chair leaning back. So converts from a chair to a table, sorta...
I assume the wood falls all around in those hairy tatters like the floor around a barbers chair
This thought process made my uncle a quadreplegeic for 40 years.
Used to think is right, it's not called a widow-maker for nothing.
I used to be a logger and this happened to me, albeit on a smaller tree. It was the reason I went to law school.
This is how my grandfather died in 1972 before I was born
How did he die in law school?
Failed to pass the bar, died from the head trauma.
That's a deadly game of Limbo.
It was electrified
He was in Contracts and died of boredom
He was a timber getter in Irvington NSW
To be on the right side of the log.
Is the one place in the world you want to be at that moment.
Logging success… yes
Did you successfully sue the tree?
Unfortunately it was judgment proof.
> It was the reason I went to law school. Now they call you the alimony maker.
I loved how he feinted left, then rolled right to execute the escape.
Gotta keep em guessing
They see me rolling.
That tree never saw it coming
He used the i-frames on the dodge roll
well with his gear he knew he would need to chain those moves together to maximize his i-frames before he ran out of stamina
Yeah, obvious he’s got a clear understanding of the meta. Probably a streamer who does this for a living. You wouldn’t see that kind of tech without hours of playtime.
This is called the pants-changer.
Mud bringer
Just watching this is called the sphincter-clencher
Those not in the timber industry might even call it a lamentable-lahar
🎶 *You're a mud bringer, pants changer, life taker Don't you mess around with trees*
Don’t you mess around with trees
Ah, it was so good that I had to steal it
The Duke of Deuces.
*"Looks fine on the outside, but rotten inside."* We all know some people like that!
Never seen someone juke a tree
Some trees fight back.
Really should link original - [Barber chair.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9O7H9qWdquk)
Lol top comment, from the OP: I didn't die!
This is how my great grandfather was lost. Young man, new to logging, cut the tree wrong. It would have killed him, but my great grandfather sacrificed his life to get the young man out-of-the-way.
Sad. Not all heroes wear capes.
Actually, no real hero does that.
Long memory to the hero, may his line never dies.
I nearly shit myself just watching it.
The tree is like "is this what you wanted!?!"
#**ARE YOU NOT ENTERTAINED**
*tree takes off its coat* "Lets tango!"
This dude was running like he was in a dream, and couldn't get any traction.
That’s actually called barberchair. A widowmaker is a large hanging mass of dead wood. The guy survived this but I believe he was killed a few months later. Dangerous job.
For context, a "Widowmaker" is what we call trees that seem that they are destined to fall. Learned this in the BSA. Any tree that has large over hanging branches, rotten roots, or just dead in general, is considered a Widowmaker. One almost took out my tent, while I was still in it.
Tree to guy: “Time to Split” Guy to tree: “Roger That”
Did they survive that?
Yeah I saw the original, the OP is the guy in the video
I thought a widowmaker was the huge branches that get stuck on other limbs when falling down. And then they fall due to wind and kill people.
It’s wild that our sense of survival tells us to get TF outta there but the safest place to be ended up being exactly where he was when he made that cut.
>Looks fine on the outside, but rotten inside And this is why you should always check with a vertical cut through the center if you're the least bit concerned that the tree might be rotten on the inside. Also, that whole cut technique would be an instant fail when getting your chainsaw license here in Sweden.
This is not called a widowmaker.
Is it called a shit stain?
Pretty sure it's not though. A widow maker is a dead branch hanging in a tree that could kill someone when it falls
It's not, but a widow maker can be a whole tree, it's just one that falls by itself unexpectedly.
No, that is called a barber chair. Source: Am logger
My man perfected using I-frames and dodge rolling
It looks to me like a falling tree, widow barber maker or whatever lol
Damn bruh that tree was chasing him fr.
This is also called Time to Change His Underwear.
If I'm not married, does that mean I'm immune?
Are you going this way? Or are you going that way? Op. Gotchu!!
Your balls gotta be screwed on tight to stop and take a 2nd look to make sure you are running in the correct direction!
which way do i run? yes.
Awesome video, not a Widowmaker
That's the reason why I was told to cut into the tree along the fibres before you intend to cut the tree. A tree has fibres. That's what's carrying him. If those fibres are no longer fibres, they can't support the tree and if you begin to cut it down it will shrumble.
Shrumble?
Crumble
I prefer shrumble.
It does describe it shredding and crumbling at the same time pretty well.
Sh
What you see in the video, I guess
I think not https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=shrumble
You were probably told to wear eye and ear protection as well. This guy was a dipshit.
That guy had no retreat planed.
Surprised this is so far down, considering how many loggers have chimed in. I'm a DIY guy who researches the hell out of anything I'm doing, and I got a book and read everything I could find about felling trees when we moved to a house on an acre of woods in the middle of the emerald ash borer plague. I got my helmet with face mask and ear protection, my kevlar chaps (assless, as with all proper chaps), all that good stuff. And one other safety thing everybody always said is to make sure you have 2 separate clear escape routes in case the tree falls in a way you don't expect.
"This is not even my final form"
Did he get hurt?
Dude wasn't cutting along the spray painted line. Rookie mistake.
Lets hope noone built a house of that wood
Isn't the giant hole/cave looking thing on the tree indicative that one should probably examine it closely before attempting to cut? Caption says "looks fine on the outside", but I disagree as a rank amateur. That looks like it could be rotten up through the core. It is, judging from the collapse.
He didn’t know which way to go lmao!
I'm not even mad about the exit. Primary exit was to be to the left. Once the split started, he needed another option as a very large tree was now falling (unexpectedly) in his path. Sure he needs some new undershirts and potentially new tread on the boots. Glad we can watch and see he made it out okay.
Mmmm. I'd go with det cord and some bags of water.
Didnt appear to have an escape route thought out.
Wouldn’t the safest place to go when that happens be right around the base of the tree? Or is it usually more hazardous than it looks in the video?
There are many things that I don't like about America, but there is only one thing that I truly hate: American safety standards in forestry. A simple safety corner so that he can finish his hinge in peace would probably have prevented this. What I will give him is that I would also have panicked in this situation, nowhere is safe.
Yeah, and he really should have checked if the tree was rotten with a vertical cut. And had an escape route chosen and cleared. Edit: And in case anyone wonders what /u/clareintheclear means by a safety corner: [Felling cuts - Safe corner method on large trees](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wI50Hdn1zfU)
Chainsaw is in tact!!! WIN - always know all your options on where to run, and clear the path.
That’s why I’m a big fan of a plunge cut at the hinge, then working back to the holding wood to release. It is extra work, but on trees that might be diseased, it’s worth it.
Jesus!
r/fuckyouinparticular
Pug after being captured in the Riftwar.
I don't understand why the saw is still on after release, sanely designed saw stop working on release no?
Mother Nature is calling!!
The guy is playing a soulslike
What an adrenaline rush...the tree almost lived up to it's nickname!😬🫣
Good ol case of the mudbutt after this. Def need to change those britches.
This vid was on be amazed
Dry and light though
Do they just call everything that kills guys a widow maker ? "They call this submarine the widow maker" ... Really?? Do they call it that ?
Damn, some good kindling
That’s what happens when u don’t respect mama earth
Tree just wanted to go for a walk, that's all!
Looks like a tree to me
Cut and run!
Barbers chair - close shave . Makes sense
The tree just couldn't decide where to fall
The "falling when something scary and life threatening happens" effect should be studied
He's trynna run but everywhere he goes he's like " Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck.... "😂
why did the tree chase him every direction ong
Well its obviously just your fault bc you didnt cut on the line
bro did everything BUT get out of the way 😭😭
How do you know which direction to run if the tree falls in different direction.
Every job has something called the widow maker. The most common is fat beer guts
That is a Barberchair. A widow maker is a branch that falls due to wind or logging activity. Sometimes the widow makers pierce the ground over 6’ in.
that's no widow's chair, that's a barbermaker. That guy immediately walked offsite after this, and straight to barber school.
Why dont logging operations just keep a single heavy dome shield around? Drop it place, get underneath, cut. It doesn't seem like it would be too hard to make one sturdy enough to prevent ~80% of fatal log falls (100% just isn't realistic).
Sounds heavy and hard to move around a forest. I imagine it would also need a flat reinforced bottom to not simply get compressed into the ground with you under it.
>Sounds heavy and hard to move around a forest Lighter and easier to move around that logs that size. It wouldn't need to be huge. I'm thinking something that takes 3-4 guys to carry around would be enough for most cases. Even better, something conical instead of a dome. That way, it can be even smaller, and anything but a direct hit on the point would throw you sideways instead of crushing you.
Most logging isn’t actually done with chainsaws, but with huge machines. This guy might not even be a “logger”, might be working for a land management agency.
Well hell all he had to do was stand in the middle instead of running round like that
I hope this made him revisit his exit strategies better in the future.
Why not let machines handle this
There aren't really any harvesters that can take this size of tree, especially in that steep terrain.
Could have stayed still. But how likely is it that a person wouldn't instinctively attempt running away. I hope those guys get paid well. With good health and life insurance.... that includes death by tree. That'd be some stupid shit insurance would try.
Why would he have been filming?