These days, putting on a harness before you climb is as automatic as putting on a pair of gloves or checking your radio channel before you start work. But any lighting technician or rigger of a certain age remembers when wearing a harness — even the ones that are illegal today for fall protection — was optional. In the early 80’s I was a house rigger at the Rockford MetroCentre in Rockford, IL. The head rigger there was Bo Medearis. Bo was a thoughtful, methodical, and confident rigger, which made him everything I wasn’t. I was young, brash, and cocky… This cluelessness wasn’t willful, but it was naïve. It never occurred to us to wear a harness…Today, organizations like ESTA and people like Jim Digby, who founded the ESA (Event Safety Alliance) have helped our learning curve to angle sharply up. SPRAT (Society of Professional Rope Access Technicians) and IRATA (Industrial Rope Access Trade Association) training give anyone who climbs an education on access and safety at height that I could only have dreamed about years ago.
—Michael Reed, from “Rigger at Large,” PLSN, Dec. 2015
