Today a young man wakes up. He struggles to get out of bed and dreads going to work. No time to take a shower hop's in a pair of clean undys puts on some jeans a t-shirt sox etc. looks in the mirror says yuck removes the crust from his eyes He stands there looking back at him self damn no time to brush teeth but time enough to comb hair. At least then he thinks to himself at least i wont look like total sh*t today. He hears his stomach growel and that burning feeling in his stomach so he says to himself damn i better eat something i cant go to work like this especially in the kinda work I'm in. looks in the fridge looks at the milk its expired but theres some vanilla soy milk. he thinks to himself well it ain't milk but i guess it will do. pours a bowel of cereal bran-flakes raspberry's and tops it off with Little sugar and adds soy-milk vanilla flavor. it surprise's him that it actually tastes good and not like sh*t. his dad is up and says you ready to go to work the young guy puts on his Burgundy sweater with hood on and shrugs his shoulder with the yeah sure shrug. He gets into the blue 98 ranger truck and is shaking cause it is cold outside so cold theres ice on windshield so him and his dad shiver as the car defrosts. Car defrosts they drive up the driveway and he gets out of the truck to unlock the gate same tired and freezing routine they do everyday to go to work. he opens the gate truck moves forward clearing the gate the young man closes the gate behind it and locks it with a rusty lock. the young man hop's back in the truck shivering and then there off to work. its about 9am that they get to the shop which is way later then what he is use to. he dreads walking into the shop because every-time he misses a day of work his two bosses his father and his partner always move the hell out of everything and its his Job to go reorganizing all the tools. which you would think wouldn't be so bad but they have over 400 tools and they use almost every single one of them everyday. Plus he knew he probably have to relocate all of them to a new location in the shop. he walks threw the door and sure enough everything was in a different place but this time everything was organized and on a pallet ready to be moved. about the only bad thing he saw was the floor was full of debree and chopped fragments of stone so he grabs the broom and starts sweeping it all up. a friend of his dad partner comes up to the young man and says "hey we missed you yesterday and pats him on the shoulder" he thinks to himself at least someone missed me because usually he doesn't feel very much needed it-turns out he actually is needed more then he realizes. so in his mind he smiles and the big 6ft 1 guy goes about helping the young man clean up. the young mans dad has started making a A'Frame rack for whats called a slab run of marble and granite. basically its this wooden triangle that looks like an A and holds heavy stuff on its sides. slabs of granite and marble are the size of a huge wall in one of those rich houses and wight usually 1000 to 900 pounds. so they finish the A frame and it takes 4 people to lift this thing on to a one ton truck. the young guy and the other three men go about setting up beams and saw horses for the new kitchen they are putting together. so the young mans dad can work on the slabs of granite and bull-nose it while the other two guys go on a slab run . well the young man sits there and pounders what can he do most of his work is completely done and its only 11am. the first time ever that he was perty much left with nothing to do all-day. so he goes around the shop which is almost the size of a small baseball Field and looks for material. His dad been wanting him to practice polishing and grinding. he sees james and a big grizzly guy and two young men that he guesses are here to unload two fraits of granite and marble. the two young kids are probably no more then 18 years old and the other looks 17. totally unexperienced and don't know sh*t working with this stuff and the big grizzly guy he remembers he had worked with him once in the past and he was totally unexperienced to so why did james hire these 3 guys to work with him to unload freight? James is this guy which i guesses A" from what people who had worked with him in the past a total rude arrogant F@#$ UP. He had quit twice and was fired once by are big boss the guy that owens the business it self. his brother was also recently let go for breaking a 900 pound slab and was warned 3 times not to put 2cm slab on the table with the Crane and to roll it up instead. gary didn't listen to the warnings and probably cost the boss 5000 dollars worth of damage all together with all the countless mistakes so he was Finlay let go. so here is james i guess being unemployed for such a long time has made him a better person i guess starving will do that to a man especially with a child and wife. nobody wanted him back in the shop and they warned the boss that when him and his brother are in the shop things happen usually bad. but the big boss is to nice of a guy so he gave him another shot but only a temporary one and not as a employee as a temp. basically a subcontractor who was responsible on getting the slabs off the two frait trucks. so i guess from the looks of it he just grab people he knew with no experience and started unloading. i don't even think are boss had any ideal about the help james hired . but james isn't a bad guy at least not like he use to be and everybody notice a huge-personality difference for the better. but what the hell was he thinking when he hired these unexperienced people. i know are boss never would had allow such unexperienced people to do that if he had knowen and just trusted james. i felt you had to knowen the background here to get in-depth ideal of what kinda people your dealing with here. boom crashing do-wen thundering sound echos across the the shop Stephenie the secretary runs in screaming yelling some one help help. I'm the closest one to the door and i dread the worst at the time in that second i think some one had drop the 700 pound limit dumpster on some one. see the dumpster was full and i know it needed to be moved it was in the way of the freight trucks and they normally use the fork lift to raise it all the way up and move it. And the sound did sound like the metal dumpster most of the material this time wasn't pieces of granite or marble so it probably weight about 400 pounds so i get out the door and lift the 400 pound dumpster not even thinking and theres nobody underneath all with in a few seconds I'm looking for a body and there isn't one. i hear yelling and screaming and this is when it hit me the worst thing in this business you hope you never see you hear story's but never see it and ho[pe you never do. the sound is coming from within the freight trucks. the one that Cary's full size granite slabs and marble. all on box freestanding pallets each with 7 slabs on it each freight holds 7000 pounds. the big metal echo sound with the crashing sound came from with in the freight. i jump up on in to the freight truck and see one person squished up algaints the wall and the very young kid squished under the slab underneath the floor. the 7000 pound freight was on top of them. no time to think i try to get them out of there not knowing my limitations nore at the time how much this sh*t weights. it wouldn't budge the secretary was calling 911 on the cell phone another guy was calling for back up from all the surrounding shops people came out of there business ruining out to-wards the container and all the people from are work shop came out jumping in trying to lift this thing off of them. we couldn't do it never have i felt so hopeless in my life as the two screamed in pain knowing very moment was crucial my dad and jeff and james were all in there trying to lever it off them with 2x4's i yeah at james to get the f#$cking fork lift and lift freight off of them he jumps off and gets the forklift. big mike shows up and he was surprisingly calm and the only one thinking straight. he calmly and speedily wrapped a strap under and over the freight attach the Crane to it and said lift. but the freight was 7000 pounds and the weight limit for the Crane was 6000 pounds so the back wheels weren't even touching the ground. james yeah for every one to get on the back of the fork lift my dad and jeff and big mike got the kid from under it drag his twitching body and lay him on-top of a crate and the other guy that was trapped in the corner got out to. the police showed up and the ambulance we already had them out and out of there they would had both been dead if the freight hadn't fallen down at a angle and it was that angle that didn't have them fully plastered into paste. all this in 5 minutes police got there in 15 minutes or less maybe more. what pissed me off was this officer was taking pictures and made them weight before they can get medical attention to stay there screaming in paine so he could get good shots. i almost kicked him in the head and off his f***king patrol car for doing it its one thing to take pics for evidence its another to hold off medical and life threatening medical attention to get pictures. i think some other cops and fire department and medical department was a Little pist about that to. you can see it on there face but they didn't say anything. they medical staff was finally allowed in and they asked for a volunteer to assist Little mike jumped in the freight truck and when he came out he was as white as a ghost. well the one guy algaints the wall walked alway with minor scratches and a twisted ankle. the kid wasn't so lucky he had a twisted foot almost turned all the way around and a bone fracture looking thing from mid calf to above his knee. the big grizzly hairy guy told the whole story and i heard what actually had happened in the container. james left them unsupervised and told them to have everything ready and cleaned up so they can be ready to get that last freight out. so they started to open the slab freight from the wrong side and they knew it and he said it shouldn't ever had happened that he knew better and felt and had a feeling that it was falling to-wards the wall and that they were on the wrong side. and well you know the rest. so the whole work day was cancled my dad and me headed home after all the people cleared out and every one was gone and i hear on the radio lots of car accident's popping up every where the radio personality on the-radio says happy friday the 13th. i look at my dad with shock todays friday the 13th ? he says yeah. damn i should had never gotten out of bed i always stay home on friday the 13th for good reasons. and always do extraordinary things on hallows eve. its been that way all my life.
Wow, Blaze! That is a dangerous line of work you lead!! Its terrible that others were hurt but I am glad you are okay. I hope you can manage to get over this soon. Be well!
OMG! That must have been very traumatic for you. These guys came so close to losing ther life. Big, big hugs to you Blaze... Take Care my friend. Uguel
no im ok its the guysunder the slabs it was trumatic my work isnt dageriouse cause i was trained better and alot of it is just common since
I know Blaze you are ok but just the thought of it must be nerve-racking! Yes, it sounds like a dangerous job but danger is unfortunately everywhere. uguel
Blaze, what's commonplace to some is exotic and dangerous to others. Just 'cuz you deal with this stuff everyday in your workplace doesn't lessen tha hazard! I'm glad you and your coworkers are safe! Keep safe!
Being an ex-ironworker I know as well as I'm sure you know, Blaze - those inexperienced and/or non-thinking people can get you hurt just as fast as they can get themselves hurt, and we don't want you to ever let that happen.
Dear buddy, What a horrible day....... I can understand what a shock it must have been for you and all of you..... I really hope the boy will recover from his wounds. I do wish him a full and soon recovery ! I also hope the bussiness is not too bad effected by this ! I'm so happy you yourself were not wounded in the accident. I really want you to be safe and healthy !!! Be safe and take good care Blazey !!!!!!!!!!!!!!! We want you safe and sound here at your birthday in a few days (if your long work-hours permit you so) All my best wishes !!! Jan.
Mr.Blaze, I am so glad that you are alright!!! You and your co-workers are in my thoughts... Regards, Kent
Blazer, It is not so much what you did write..but rather the way you presented it. Not only is it non-fiction..it has all the elements of a good story..one of the best presentation I have read in a long time . 10 other people could have experienced the same day as you and have been ask to write it up..yours still would have come up on top because of your keen powers of observation..the way you presented your thoughts..and let the reader follow you. What I am trying to tell you here Time for you to develop and turn that skill in your free time from an avocation to thoughts about serious $$$. Regards, John
