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Jay Manka, from left, Sam Tilford, Luis Montoya and Stacy Cheney hook up a load of logs with chokers, cables of 3/4-inch steel that are used to haul the logs to the landing area, where they are prepared for shipping.
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Jay Manka watches a carriage as it pulls a turn of logs on a skyline up a hill toward the yarder in the early morning hours at a logging site in the Yellow Creek area recently near Tyee .
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The News-Review's Christian Bringhurst confidently pulls a choker and its matching bell under a log, only to learn that the bell was supposed to stay on the other side of the log.
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Luis Montoya, left, Jay Manka, Sam Tilford and Phil Buchanan untangle choker cables before the team moves out to secure a turn of logs in the Yellow Creek area near Tyee recently.
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Sam Tilford works at the landing area of a logging site in the Yellow Creek area near Tyee. In the background, chasers John Conklin and Jeff Dunham use chain saws to cut logs to size before they are hauled off the hill by truck.
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A plume of smoke rises from a yarder as it warms up in preparation for the first logs of the day in the Yellow Creek area near Tyee recently.
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Setting chokers is a punishing way to make a living.
Working in the woods in all kinds of weather, hauling heavy equipment around and hiking up and down rough, often steep and uneven terrain wears down even the most rugged of individuals.
Jay Manka would know. The 45-year-old Roseburg man has been setting chokers and doing other logging jobs for about 20 years. He currently works for Don Whitaker Logging as a rigging slinger leading a three-man choker-setting crew.
“My job’s just pickin’ turns, how many logs go in the turn, gettin’ ‘em set and then gettin’ people out into the clear.”
For the uninitiated, a “turn” is a load of logs wrapped up with 30-foot “chokers,” or 3/4-inch steel cables, which are in turn fastened to a “carriage” that travels up and down the logging site by means of a cable system run by a machine called a “yarder.” The yarder is basically a massive, diesel-powered winch that hauls the logs to the landing site, where the chokers are unfastened and the logs are cut to size by “chasers” with chain saws.
In spite of the dizzying array of such technical terms a rookie choker setter might be expected to learn, Manka insists the job doesn’t take very long to pick up.
“Setting chokers just takes a couple days,” Manka said. “Learning to pull riggin’ takes a little longer; gotta be around a while. There’s a lot of different equipment to learn to run.”
Manka and his co-workers begin their work day early, leaving town anywhere between 3:30 and 4:30 a.m., depending on the distance of the logging site. The crew typically travels together in a van, referred to as a “crummy.”
Working in the woods in all kinds of weather, hauling heavy equipment around and hiking up and down rough, often steep and uneven terrain wears down even the most rugged of individuals.
Jay Manka would know. The 45-year-old Roseburg man has been setting chokers and doing other logging jobs for about 20 years. He currently works for Don Whitaker Logging as a rigging slinger leading a three-man choker-setting crew.
“My job’s just pickin’ turns, how many logs go in the turn, gettin’ ‘em set and then gettin’ people out into the clear.”
For the uninitiated, a “turn” is a load of logs wrapped up with 30-foot “chokers,” or 3/4-inch steel cables, which are in turn fastened to a “carriage” that travels up and down the logging site by means of a cable system run by a machine called a “yarder.” The yarder is basically a massive, diesel-powered winch that hauls the logs to the landing site, where the chokers are unfastened and the logs are cut to size by “chasers” with chain saws.
In spite of the dizzying array of such technical terms a rookie choker setter might be expected to learn, Manka insists the job doesn’t take very long to pick up.
“Setting chokers just takes a couple days,” Manka said. “Learning to pull riggin’ takes a little longer; gotta be around a while. There’s a lot of different equipment to learn to run.”
Manka and his co-workers begin their work day early, leaving town anywhere between 3:30 and 4:30 a.m., depending on the distance of the logging site. The crew typically travels together in a van, referred to as a “crummy.”
One recent work day found Manka and his co-workers bound for a site in the Yellow Creek area near Tyee.
The site was newly cleared and rich with the aroma of fresh-cut fir trees, its gently sloping hillside littered with fallen evergreen logs, limbs and stumps. The crew arrived just as daylight began to cast its glow upon the forested hills and valleys around them. As boots and hard hats were donned, the rumbling yarder emitted a plume of gray smoke as it was warmed up in preparation for the first logs of the day.
<b>TOUGH TERRAIN</b>
A typical logging operation occurs in several stages.
The site is surveyed ahead of time to determine the best spot for a landing, the ideal lanes for hauling logs uphill, and potential “tail holds,” or anchors, to which guy wires and “skylines” — the line to which the carriage is fastened — will be fastened for securing the yarder and transporting the logs. Trees and stumps typically work best.
Once the trees are felled and the yarder is set up with all its cables secured, a crew can go to work.
To the casual observer, the work of a choker setter seems fairly routine: You wait for the chokers to come down the line via the carriage, grab the chokers and fasten them round the logs you’ve selected and then get out of the way. However, the log selection process is a little trickier than it looks, which is where Manka’s experience comes into play.
The scene confronting Manka and the others on his logging crew on any given day is a mass of tangled limbs and logs. With that many logs tied up together, other logs or debris often spring loose from the pile when logs are pulled from the middle of it.
The site was newly cleared and rich with the aroma of fresh-cut fir trees, its gently sloping hillside littered with fallen evergreen logs, limbs and stumps. The crew arrived just as daylight began to cast its glow upon the forested hills and valleys around them. As boots and hard hats were donned, the rumbling yarder emitted a plume of gray smoke as it was warmed up in preparation for the first logs of the day.
<b>TOUGH TERRAIN</b>
A typical logging operation occurs in several stages.
The site is surveyed ahead of time to determine the best spot for a landing, the ideal lanes for hauling logs uphill, and potential “tail holds,” or anchors, to which guy wires and “skylines” — the line to which the carriage is fastened — will be fastened for securing the yarder and transporting the logs. Trees and stumps typically work best.
Once the trees are felled and the yarder is set up with all its cables secured, a crew can go to work.
To the casual observer, the work of a choker setter seems fairly routine: You wait for the chokers to come down the line via the carriage, grab the chokers and fasten them round the logs you’ve selected and then get out of the way. However, the log selection process is a little trickier than it looks, which is where Manka’s experience comes into play.
The scene confronting Manka and the others on his logging crew on any given day is a mass of tangled limbs and logs. With that many logs tied up together, other logs or debris often spring loose from the pile when logs are pulled from the middle of it.
So Manka must assess which logs can be paired together and assign each choker setter his log, or logs. Then he directs the crew where to stand so any falling hazards are well out of range of the workers.
To minimize the chance of injury, choker setters wear rugged clothes such as Carrharts, leather gloves and caulk (pronounced “cork”) boots that have steel nubs or spikes on the soles to improve traction.
There’s a good reason for this. The terrain is filled with branches, stumps, logs, brush and freshly turned earth, piles of which may stand taller than their heads. Factor in wet or snowy Oregon weather and sometimes precipitously steep hillsides, and it’s a natural obstacle course.
“It makes it a little tougher when it’s raining because it could be a little slippery when you’re walking and your ‘corks’ don’t dig in as well if they’re not sharp,” Manka said. “The longer you do it, the easier it gets, ‘cause your legs get in shape and you get the experience on how to get in the clear the easiest way.”
By “in the clear,” Manka means out of the way of any potential falling objects, like other trees.
“I’ve never been hit with any logs, but I’ve had a few close calls,” Manka said.
As if to underscore the point, Manka was hit by a piece of wooden debris that very day, leaving a raw scrape on his forehead.
“I hate when that happens!” Manka exclaimed right afterward, readjusting his helmet.
‘Y’all right?” called co-worker Stacy Cheney of Green, the crew’s safety supervisor.
“This is a hard-hat area,” joked Manka in answer.
To minimize the chance of injury, choker setters wear rugged clothes such as Carrharts, leather gloves and caulk (pronounced “cork”) boots that have steel nubs or spikes on the soles to improve traction.
There’s a good reason for this. The terrain is filled with branches, stumps, logs, brush and freshly turned earth, piles of which may stand taller than their heads. Factor in wet or snowy Oregon weather and sometimes precipitously steep hillsides, and it’s a natural obstacle course.
“It makes it a little tougher when it’s raining because it could be a little slippery when you’re walking and your ‘corks’ don’t dig in as well if they’re not sharp,” Manka said. “The longer you do it, the easier it gets, ‘cause your legs get in shape and you get the experience on how to get in the clear the easiest way.”
By “in the clear,” Manka means out of the way of any potential falling objects, like other trees.
“I’ve never been hit with any logs, but I’ve had a few close calls,” Manka said.
As if to underscore the point, Manka was hit by a piece of wooden debris that very day, leaving a raw scrape on his forehead.
“I hate when that happens!” Manka exclaimed right afterward, readjusting his helmet.
‘Y’all right?” called co-worker Stacy Cheney of Green, the crew’s safety supervisor.
“This is a hard-hat area,” joked Manka in answer.
He needn’t remind Cheney of that.
The 39-year-old used to do Manka’s job — among others — until he was hit by a log himself in 2004. Cheney was logging in the Coos Bay Wagon Road area when a log sprung loose from a rock bluff above and caught him in the side of the face, hurling him downhill some 50 feet. Few expected him to survive the accident, which broke several bones in his face, hip and shoulder and left him in a coma for several days.
He recovered much of his mobility and has been able to work around the traumatic brain injury he sustained, but he can no longer log. Don Whitaker ultimately gave him a job as his personnel safety director.
“I guess part of my job now is to make sure that it don’t happen to somebody else out here,” Cheney said. “The most important thing out here is to make sure you go home at night.”
Other hazards exist as well. Once the carriage stops and the choker setters move in to secure their logs, the chokers are still whipping round like live wires. Asked if anybody ever gets hit by the cables or the heavy clasps at their ends, a reporter is told that’s why so many loggers have missing teeth.
The 39-year-old used to do Manka’s job — among others — until he was hit by a log himself in 2004. Cheney was logging in the Coos Bay Wagon Road area when a log sprung loose from a rock bluff above and caught him in the side of the face, hurling him downhill some 50 feet. Few expected him to survive the accident, which broke several bones in his face, hip and shoulder and left him in a coma for several days.
He recovered much of his mobility and has been able to work around the traumatic brain injury he sustained, but he can no longer log. Don Whitaker ultimately gave him a job as his personnel safety director.
“I guess part of my job now is to make sure that it don’t happen to somebody else out here,” Cheney said. “The most important thing out here is to make sure you go home at night.”
Other hazards exist as well. Once the carriage stops and the choker setters move in to secure their logs, the chokers are still whipping round like live wires. Asked if anybody ever gets hit by the cables or the heavy clasps at their ends, a reporter is told that’s why so many loggers have missing teeth.
Also, other cables such as the skyline have extraordinary tension on them. If one were to break, it would not go well for the logger in its path.
Such dangers notwithstanding, Cheney said logging these days is well-regulated by organizations such as the Occupational Safety and Health Administration and the industry itself, and is basically as safe as a logger is willing to make it.
<b>TEAM EFFORT</b>
Of course, a logging operation is not just about the choker setters.
Up above at the landing site is a yarder engineer, a shovel operator and a crew of chasers, who unhook the chokers and either run the processor that cuts logs to size and stacks them or — in the absence of a processor — perform such tasks with chain saws. Once the logs have been cut and stacked they are ready to be hauled away by truck.
Rounding out the team is a hook tender, who runs the “line truck” that is used to move the tail holds and skyline from one part of the site to another.
The work is hard and the days are long for everybody involved, which may account for the high turnover in the industry.
“You can find guys left and right that will come out here and work for a day or two,” Cheney said. “But to get guys that are dedicated, that really wanna do it, it’s hard to find ’em.”
“This job does take a toll on you,” said Sam Tilford, another member of Manka’s team. “You wear your body out fast.”
Such dangers notwithstanding, Cheney said logging these days is well-regulated by organizations such as the Occupational Safety and Health Administration and the industry itself, and is basically as safe as a logger is willing to make it.
<b>TEAM EFFORT</b>
Of course, a logging operation is not just about the choker setters.
Up above at the landing site is a yarder engineer, a shovel operator and a crew of chasers, who unhook the chokers and either run the processor that cuts logs to size and stacks them or — in the absence of a processor — perform such tasks with chain saws. Once the logs have been cut and stacked they are ready to be hauled away by truck.
Rounding out the team is a hook tender, who runs the “line truck” that is used to move the tail holds and skyline from one part of the site to another.
The work is hard and the days are long for everybody involved, which may account for the high turnover in the industry.
“You can find guys left and right that will come out here and work for a day or two,” Cheney said. “But to get guys that are dedicated, that really wanna do it, it’s hard to find ’em.”
“This job does take a toll on you,” said Sam Tilford, another member of Manka’s team. “You wear your body out fast.”
Tilford, 25, of Riddle has been logging for about four years. During that time he’s been hit three times, though none of the incidents was so serious that he was sidelined.
“The only thing that keeps us safe out here is our brains and our boots, ’cause you gotta be able to run and know when to run and when to stop and where to stand,” Tilford said. “There is a reason why ... it was number one or number two (on the list of) most dangerous jobs in the world.”
Tilford currently works as second rigging slinger and choker setter with Manka and Luis Montoya. Montoya, 44, of Roseburg brings 20 years of logging experience of his own to the job.
Second rigging slinger is a kind of backup for the rigging slinger in case something happens to him. Both rigging slingers wear a “bug,” an electronic signal that blows a horn to let the yarder engineer up on the landing know what’s going on. A predetermined number of horns are blown to signal it’s time to pull a turn up the hill, for example, while another number will tell the engineer to stop, and yet another may signal the carriage needs to be lowered.
The signal for quitting time at 3:30 p.m. is two horns — one long burst followed by a short one — though after a full day’s work the loggers’ bodies probably let them know when it’s time to wrap it up.
“This is a tiring job, but when you walk out at the end of the day you feel good about what you did,” Cheney said. “I take pride in what I do.”
• You can reach Web editor/Assistant City Editor Christian Bringhurst at 957-4216 or by e-mail at cbringhurst@newsreview.info.
“The only thing that keeps us safe out here is our brains and our boots, ’cause you gotta be able to run and know when to run and when to stop and where to stand,” Tilford said. “There is a reason why ... it was number one or number two (on the list of) most dangerous jobs in the world.”
Tilford currently works as second rigging slinger and choker setter with Manka and Luis Montoya. Montoya, 44, of Roseburg brings 20 years of logging experience of his own to the job.
Second rigging slinger is a kind of backup for the rigging slinger in case something happens to him. Both rigging slingers wear a “bug,” an electronic signal that blows a horn to let the yarder engineer up on the landing know what’s going on. A predetermined number of horns are blown to signal it’s time to pull a turn up the hill, for example, while another number will tell the engineer to stop, and yet another may signal the carriage needs to be lowered.
The signal for quitting time at 3:30 p.m. is two horns — one long burst followed by a short one — though after a full day’s work the loggers’ bodies probably let them know when it’s time to wrap it up.
“This is a tiring job, but when you walk out at the end of the day you feel good about what you did,” Cheney said. “I take pride in what I do.”
• You can reach Web editor/Assistant City Editor Christian Bringhurst at 957-4216 or by e-mail at cbringhurst@newsreview.info.
Who are these guys?
Stacy CheneyAge: 39
Residence: Green
Job title: Personnel safety
director
Logging experience: 21 years
About the job: “I always tell these guys to not be looking downward, to always be looking around you, everywhere you look, because pretty much everything that can happen to you is above you.”
Jay Manka
Age: 45
Residence: Roseburg
Job title: Rigging slinger
Logging experience: 20 years
About the job: “When you’re on steep terrain, you wanna log downhill on it so you’re above the logs, that way if you knock anything loose it goes downhill away from you.”
Luis Montoya
Age: 44
Residence: Roseburg
Job title: Choker setter
Logging experience: 20 years
About the job: “The part I don’t like is when it gets a lot of snow, that’s the only part I don’t like — you’re cold all day, you know.”
Sam Tilford
Age: 25
Residence: Riddle
Job title: Second rigger
Logging experience: 4 years
About the job: “I got hit in the ankle once ... I had a log roll off of a deck, one of the logs on the landing — it was a small one — hit me in the back of the leg. Had one that caught me in the back and rolled me over and slammed me between it and another log.”
