This is what the Lord says: “Cursed is the one who trusts in man, who draws strength from mere flesh and whose heart turns away from the Lord.” -Jeremiah 17:5

Welcome back to the Turbine Traveler. I’m a traveling wind technician that happens to have a blog website as well. Thank you for taking the time out of your day to read my blog post, it means the world to me.

Diving into today’s topic is a hearty one. The google definition of fear is; “an unpleasant emotion caused by the belief that someone or something is dangerous, likely to cause pain or a threat.” Now that is a great description of what fear is, but what it doesn’t accomplish is the individual feeling of fear from the person perspective.

Let’s get into one of my fears and how I overcome it, and maybe you can too. Personally I’m afraid of heights. My hands get sweaty, my eyes are darting around, my knees tremble and feel weak, and I feel like a small gust of wind could knock me over. The fear of heights for me in ways has limited my abilities in my personal and work life.

Going up ~150 feet in the man basket

In my profession we wear full body harnesses with fall protection & arrest systems. Now that may sound like a bunch of words but let’s break it down:

Full body harness: Harness that envelops the whole body to spread weight evenly in the event of a fall. The harness if rated up to 5kn of force. You can be up to 310 pounds as an individual and the harness will catch you.

Fall protection system: Usually consists of a work positioner. A rope with a hook on either side, you can use it to hold yourself so you won’t go over an edge or use it to hold yourself to the ladder so you can work with both hands.

Fall arrest system: Usually consists of lanyards. This is what you see on the movies, it is a lanyard that is attached to the harness and if you fall this is what is going to catch you. Newer synthetic lanyards can stretch allowing the victim to slowly descend to a stop when they fall.

All these tools come together to keep me safe in the event of a fall. Now nobody ever plans on falling but in the event I do I know that I am safe. I always make sure I am tied off somewhere and my partner is as well.

It took some time getting used to heights. The first time I climbed a turbine I didn’t look down, like at all. Climbing up isn’t hard it is the climbing down part that is hard. Once you are on top of the wind turbine and inside the nacelle, you won’t notice your up at heights. Sometimes you can feel the turbine sway in the wind but nothing to serious.

I have found that increasing my knowledge about certain topics helps me to calm my anxiety about the heights I face almost everyday. Knowing that the harness, lanyard, and all the equipment that is attached to me is rated to a weight that I cannot exceed. The harness, lanyard, and all the equipment is rated to withstand 5kn. Now what does 5kn mean, well kn is short for Kilo-newtons. Kilo meaning thousand and newtons is a measurement of force that is applied to an object. So 5kn actually stands for 5000 newtons of force. To put that into perspective 5000 newtons is equal to 1124 pounds of force.

Putting all these numbers into perspective allows me to calming make decisions at height knowing that I am safe and protected. With that being said I still will not put myself in the chance of having to use any of the equipment. What I mean is, I won’t go reaching half way out of the man basket to grab something in the air. There is no sense to, your PPE is made to be of last defense. Meaning everything else in the world had to go wrong before that is used.

Thank you again for taking the time and reading my blog post, it truly means the world to me. Feel free the share these posts, like them, or comment.