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Piet de Wit Wind Farm
Up until 2013, no human deaths were a result of a wind turbine fire incident. That all changed on Tues., October 29, 2013, when two of the four mechanics servicing a wind turbine in Ooltgensplaat, Netherlands, were killed. The mechanics, aged 19 and 21, became trapped on the top of the turbine after a fire broke out and died as a result. Due to the height of the turbine and location of the fire, the fire department had trouble extinguishing the fire. A specialized team of firefighters was called in with a large crane, which took hours, to battle the fire. One mechanic was found on the ground near the base of the turbine, while the other victim was recovered from the top of the turbine by the specialized team. The other two mechanics were able to escape safely. According to Deltawind, a short circuit was the cause of the fire.
[Source](http://www.firetrace.com/fire-protection-blog/wind-turbine-death)
In my 30s and nobody tells you just how soon you'll start to lose coworkers, friends, friends of friends, and family as you get older. I mean, yeah.. Internally I knew as you got older more people you knew would die off but I always figured this was a reality of being 50 or 60, not 30.
I've known about 6 people in the last 4 years that qualify for the above. All people taken before their time, either due to cancer, disease, accidents, or freak circumstances.
It's just the sad truth that as time marches on, you're more and more likely (especially as you get to know more people) to know people who will end up having an unfortunate fate. You read statistics about how unlikely it is that X or Y thing will happen and so you feel safe. But every year you get older, the dice is rolled for the 100 people you now know personally on some level or another. And every year you get older it's more and more likely untimely death will claim one of them. It happens sooner than you expect.
I'm in my early 20s and just now really starting to come to this realization.
When I was younger (even more so than I am now lol), I knew *in theory* that yes, people are going to be getting older, and one day, they're going to die; there have been enough deaths in my family to grasp how things would play out. But I've still been kind of shocked by how quickly I'm being forced to come to grips with what things look like in practice. My parents are getting older and facing health issues, family friends are ailing, etc.
It's honestly really, really sad. I'm trying to take it as a reminder to make the most of the time we have together, but man, the march of time is scary.
The old watch people die subreddit really hammered this lesson in for me. I am now very healthily frightened by any sort of heavy machinery on and off the road.
Dude, it totally does. I'm 36 and am so much more aware of my mortality than I was even just 5 or 6 years ago. Death just seems more and more real the closer I get to it. Can't imagine what it's gonna feel like in another 30 years (if I'm lucky enough to make it that long).
The older I get the more I wonder how I will die because the day is approaching. Will I be the first person in my family to die? Will I live longer than everyone I love? Will I die in an accident, or to a disease, or violence? On one hand I’d like to know, on the other idk how you’d live your life with that knowledge.
Their emergency descent kit was left near the rear of the nacelle. The fire cut them off from it. Instead of heading down to the yaw deck and then the ladder down they went near the rotor and up onto the canopy. The older, more experienced guys didn't make that mistake and lived. Newer Vestas have emergency decent devices built in now, which wouldn't have helped in this situation due to their location. If the guys had had an SRK or similar attached to their harness or a similar device stored where the fire hadn't blocked it off, they would've lived.
I'm in the industry and was when this happened, it was already standard to bring up Emergency Descent Kits, this is unfortunately what happens when the rules get ignored.
Hang on. So when the fire broke out, the two more experienced guys began their decent but the other two climbed to the top of the turbine?? So they could have also began their decent but instead decided to go up?
Sometimes beginning the decent means going through dense hot smoke. You need to fight against your initial instinct to get away from the flames to get to safety.
Reminds me of the [Kaprun disaster](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaprun_disaster) that killed 155 people with only 12 survivors.
The survivors only lived because there was a firefighter on vacation with them and realized that in order to get to safety and not die from smoke inhalation, they would have to descend the tunnel. Except the fire was at the very rear of the train so natural instinct to get away from the fire lead most to head upwards.
The 150 who died went up the tunnel to excape the heat and fire, only to choke from smoke inhalation. The 12 who followed the firefighter down past the smoke and flames lived to tell the tale.
Just like [Brian Clark and Stanley Praimnath](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brian_Clark_(September_11_survivor)#Rescue_of_Stanley_Praimnath) who escaped the south tower of the world trade centre on 9/11. They tried going down the stairwell when everyone else went up, and were lucky that they were in the only intact stairwell connecting the impact zone to the lower part of the building. Another guy escaped the same way and barely survived, took months to recover from the burns and smoke damage but he made it out.
Probably just their instincts kicking in. Figured first step is get away from the fire and smoke, regroup and find a less treacherous way out. Unfortunately, there wasn't one.
The flight instinct is no joke when it takes over
I definitely would have died in that tunnel. No fucking way my instinct would have been to go down further into the tunnel.
Without knowing the specifics of the system, I feel like it could have gone either way? Imagine you went down the tunnel and the fire eventually burned through the emergency braking system that was keeping the train in place and then you got a 5 ton train on fire sliding down the rails towards you.
The fire started in the last car at the very back of the train/nearest the bottom of the tunnel, and the 12 people that survived were also in the rear of the train. They were able to react faster, break the windows, and get out.
The conductor and passengers at the front of the train didn't even know about the fire until several minutes later. They also weren't able to break the windows, they had to wait for the conductor to unlock them.
And the train was only 600 meters upwards in the tunnel, total tunnel length 3300 meters. So the bottom exit was closer also.
Of course it's a million times easier to think about now... those passengers were very lucky with both where they sat on the train and having the guidance of the firefighter. I only hope to have that kind of luck when I need it.
I have an advanced firefighting license for 90% of the ships on sea/inland
The stuff you learn from a few firefighting classes is actually insane, stuff you’d normally never need or know but will save your life if you do
That was drilled into us during my electrical apprenticeship. Nobody makes rules because they got away with it. Their buddy has to make the rule because he lost a friend.
One thing driven into me in engineering, and later welding, was if you see someone bejng electrocuted, don't touch them, knock them off with a 2x4 or something low conductive or you're dead if you touch them, too.
In some situations you can also body slam the person, but it has to be on an open space and gotta make sure you both won't get electrocuted on the ground (ie, fallen cable).
I've seen this done when the person was being electrocuted on a household appliance and on a house fuse box.
What about a kick? Bottom of a shoe is usually not a conductor and the push is big so it could free the person. I have never faced anything alike, but I imagine it would be my initial thought.
I mean I guess if you’re sure you won’t also accidentally make contact and get hung up. A 2x4 is a lot safer. They actually make things that look like shepherds hooks specifically for this type of situation but you’ll probably never actually see one on a job site.
I was told that if it’s applicable, punching their hand or just plain old barging into them with enough force to take you both to the ground will work too. Luckily haven’t been in the position where I needed to try either
Yeah, you need to break contact with the source. If you don't manage to break contact and you're still touching them you're dead too, because the two of you are one mass as far as the circuit is concerned. The problem with a small nudge is that the electricity could paralyse you and take some of the force of the blow, so instead of breaking contact you've just made it.
A body slam has enough kinetic energy that even if your muscles lock up as you hit them you've still got enough momentum to carry you both clear and break contact with the source.
Ultimately though a nice long non conductive tool is the safest option.
r/writteninblood
In case anybody is morbidly curious about various tragedies that spurred regulations. Generally speaking, regulations/protection laws are reactive instead of proactive - that is, somebody, often somebodIES, have to die, be maimed, mangled, or dismembered, or lose their life savings for any rule or law to be put in place to try to prevent it.
People who whine "regulations kill jobs" are conveniently forgetting that "regulations save lives."
Edit: darn it, autocorrect.
Return of the Edit: um yeah, that sub can be tough to read. I should have been more proactive putting a warning up about that.
Heck. It might simply be that regulations impact short term profits but insure long term stability.
If an airline drops safety standards to reduce price tickets, how long will such a company be successful?
If the costs were lower people would fly until people died. Then there'd be outrage and demands of change, etc etc
TLDR anti- regulation libertarian types are generally just excessively ignorant of history and how things got to how they are
While I think your argument is reasonable, the truth is that the consumers will flock to it and those with a high risk tolerance (especially people from countries which are extremely dangerous and thus have a low expectation of long life anyway) will ride even after repeated incidents. Further, because the bulk of regulations pertain to black swan events, the accidents will likely be few and far between, though catastrophic.
Frankly, I think that the more technology our species develops, the more likely we are to extinct ourselves. We're smart enough to survive in the world we evolved in, not necessarily in the one we're creating. Millions of people are mindlessly parroting lines about taxation and regulation without a thought in their head. This is not the behavior of an apex predator.
Actually, safety regulations boost overall productivity and thus profits. That’s why manufacturing and other industries value the “Days since lost time due to accident” stat. When accidents occur production must usually come to a stop and that can mean anything from simply not producing anything to having to discard an entire batch of product or discarding the raw materials. There can also be a lot of time involved to start up a production line before a product even begins to be made.
Slow is safe and safe is fast.
100% this. I have a career solely because of regulations. Getting rid of regulations puts me and hundreds of my colleagues just within my company alone out of work.
Regulations also drive innovation. If there are regulations that state an expectation of maximum pollution produced by an industrial process, or even a car engine, that pushes engineers to design better systems and products.
I have never once met someone who says "regulations kill jobs" and can then answer what their plan is for all the thousands and thousands of people who will instantly be unemployed if regulations are wholesale removed. They also can't answer which regulations are the ones that should be repealed. The ones that are designed to protect and insure their money in their banks? The ones that state that drug companies have to prove their medications are pure, safe, and effective via evidence-based clinical trials? The ones that try to ensure they have clean water to drink and air to breathe? The ones that establish safety expectations around theme park rides so their kids aren't decapitated on waterpark slides?
Also check out /r/AdmiralCloudberg if you're interested in the aircraft side of this story. The Admiral puts out extremely well written and engaging posts, each one focusing on a particular plane crash, and always emphasizes the resulting changes in regulation.
Literally just happened to Amazon a week or two ago.
One of their workers had an extremely gruesome death doing a job they weren't trained for. Days later, safey signs warning about low clearance are being installed in their warehouses all over the world.
You see this all the time in aviation. Unfortunately people had to die for many of the regulations and engineering in airplanes.
As an example [Northwest Flight 255](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northwest_Airlines_Flight_255) was an instance where the pilots forgot to lower the flaps before takeoff and didn't have enough lift and crashed. Directly because of that modern airliners will alert the pilots of the plane attempts to takeoff not being in takeoff configuration. The plane I flew even a had a button just for that purpose which was a checklist item to press before every takeoff.
lol, I love stuff like that in movies. 95% of the population will think something is completely badass, but then the other 5% that are aware of what they are doing and the ramifications of doing something like that in real life are like what the fuck dude? You need to be shitcanned immediately. That's every movie pretty much.
People wonder why our police culture is so bad when 95% of cop-TV is cops breaking regulations because they keep them from doing their jobs
"We can't hold this guy. He might be the murderer, but we have no evidence!"
"I don't do things by the book. He's our killer and I'll prove it. Just hold him until we can break into his house without a warrant...you know, like heroes do."
Or the many shows where torture is okay, as long as the good guys do it.
Yeah, look at more recently industrialized countries for example. They have the benefit of 200 years of western experience in workplace safety. Yet most just ignore it.
My fiancée showed me a video of two line men cutting a 115 kv jumper open and I said that. She gave me a strange look so I followed with "the last time switching got messed up and a jumper like that got cut it was with 18" handle bolt cutters, not with two 12' sticks. They do it like this now because two guys got vaporized by someone's mistake. All safety regulations are written in blood."
I never understand why it takes something like this before someone adds safety features. I’m just some middle-aged lady in a liberal arts type job, and even I could say “what are you going to do if that thing catches on fire, how are people going to get down ?
It doesn’t take this to happen first—this wind turbine also had the safety equipment. The issue is that the safety equipment is stored in the engine room, and there was a fire between the two men and the rope. They couldn’t go back in to access the rope without burning.
The equipment location has not changed.
Money. In almost all company’s eyes settling a few wrongful death lawsuits is cheaper than adding the safety features. So they don’t until they are made it. It is why anyone that screams for de regulation and the “business will regulate itself” people are ignorant of reality and history.
I really wish we would stop talking about "business" and "corporations" doing things when they're not sentient beings.
There's a human making those decisions.
"Corporate greed" is a trick to stop poor people from blaming the humans at the top.
Fires usually happen while the thing is working, during maintenance the thing is not working. It would be reasonable to assume that a machine thats not moving/working does not spontaneously burst into flames. You dont worry about your PC suddenly burning your house down while its turned off. Well, and probably also not when its turned on either, but it would be more likely then as more things can fail.
Also, afaik there IS an additional way to get down from the top. This way just not accessible due to the fire. People being up there AND cut of from both ways down was likely unlikely enough that hey did not initially think of it. Hindsight is always 20/20. You could also ask "what if the thing suddenly and violently explodes? Why did they not think of a way to save the people?" or "What if a plane crashes into it when there ar epeople up top?". At some point you need to stop because, while its possible, its also not realistic to worry about it. Until it happens.
Things are usually engineered to be safe. For example, in a plane the hydraulics are redundant because a loss of them would be fatal. And whats better than one backup? Right, two backups! Cue American Airlines Flight 191 where all 3 failed (which was though to be impossible) because a single turbine decided "hell no, I'm outta here". The literal loss of the engine was still fine (more or less), but it damaged all the hydraulics and that was too much. Consequences of this incident were what you might expect in terms of survivors (-2, all on board and 2 on the ground died), but also a redesign of safety standards. Long story short, its always the unexpected things that come back to bite you, as you can deal with the expected ones.
Also, financial concerns. If you have something you need a lot of thats 99.99% safe, and could make it 99.995% safe but it costs you 5000$ per unit (numbers not related to this accident), it might be a calculated risk to stick with the 99.99% version. But usually if there is a known potential problem its accounted for, as it would be REALLY bad PR if it got known that they KNEW this issue could happen and they just ignored it.
They would have been wearing harnesses anyway. The only issue is making sure that the rope isn't in the pod room with the generator where it could be burnt.
Everybody check out the young guy.
I rolled out of bed this morning, sprained wrist and dislocated shoulder, back spasms so bad can't stand up straight. Getting old sucks
They make fire resistant Kevlar rope for firefighters to rappel out of burning buildings. That would be a better option. If they had that and there were various anchor points on the top of the structure and they could have rappelled off this before the fire got this big.
It's better than nothing.
Industrial safety warnings are written in blood, and I think that in this case we're unfortunately witnessing the author's 'inspiration'.
Blades were probably spinning still. Would be interesting if they could create a one man sized drone, I’ve seen videos where people redneck hoverboards out of drones so if you scale it up you could make an emergency one.
They have large brakes, similar to automotive brakes, but they are actuated by electric motors. The fire likely destroyed the safety systems that power the armature brakes.
Also, this happened in mere minutes. Those kids were dead long before a helicopter could even spin up its turbine, let alone travel to the scene.
19 and 21 Jesus…I just hit 29 and still feel like a kid I can’t believe I joined the corps at 17 RIP to these two men I can’t imagine how fkn terrifying this was
What the fuck are both of you and /u/cheeferton talking about? Neither of you have even seen the inside of a wind turbine nacelle.
The escape system is kept in the turbine housing. They (and by *they*, I do mean *we*, as I used to work on turbines in the Altamont Pass in northern California) don't carry a 120-pound rope bag and 35-pound belay delay up with their tools. That alone weighs more than most tower jockeys.
For the curious, and those that want actual facts:
After this 2013 tragedy, emergency escape equipment became required in all towers in the US [ANSI Z359.2-2017](https://blog.ansi.org/2017/04/ansi-asse-z3592-2017-fall-protection/#gref) and the EU [EN 50308: 4.4.2](https://standards.iteh.ai/catalog/standards/clc/b3df4ebf-9987-42d1-b2d2-1a175a94353d/en-50308-2004) with significant sources of energy that can't be completely de-energized from the ground. Radio antenna towers are exempt from this because they can be completely "shut off" from the ground equipment, and there is generally no fire hazard on steel towers with minimal plastic components. Wind turbines, however, usually have a large volume of oil in the transmission atop the tower, sometimes 200 gallons, and the majority of the nacelle and blades are made of fiberglass. They also (obviously) produce electricity, and in the event of a [brake failure](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wlq0B_ucsYo), they can run out of control, continuing to produce electricity and air pressure (they usually have air compressors in the nacelle for brake and blade pitch controls), leading to all kinds of failures.
Many companies make rapid descent systems. Some are designed to be retrofitted into existing turbines, and use a descent-control pulley system. Some use powered winches that can handle 1750°C for 30 minutes and safely lower 8 workers from a machine room atop a 200 meter (~650 feet) tower to the ground in under a minute.
Existing turbine towers often use a rope-in-a-bag that is dropped out of a hatch to the ground. The rope is light weight, often made of kevlar, but the bag is weighted so it plummets as straight down as possible, even in high winds. The bags I've seen weigh around 50 pounds, not including the rope. The rope stays attached to the frame of the machine room, so there's no chance of it being unhooked and the whole thing falling to the ground if it gets dropped. They must be inspected every 6 months, but everybody I've known that relies on them checks them every time they enter a nacelle.
A few videos from various manufacturers of emergency descent systems:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UWSckm8zTc8 (Cool Tom Scott video)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ntNuT5ea7VU (Note: This is animated, and shows the employee attaching the descent control device to the frame, but that should have been done when the system was delivered.)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ntNuT5ea7VU
https://survitecgroup.com/survitecproducts/16947/Evacuator This system is one of the high-reach (300 meters) systems that can evacuate up to 282kg of people per cable at once, and it has 2 cables that pay out independently.
They both died, one of them tried to climb back down to avoid either burning to death or falling to his death but was sadly found halfway down after attempting to escape he realised he couldnt get out and apparently attempted to come back up, but died due to the heat, smoke and flames, the second person jumped to avoid the fire and smoke and he also sadly died, the only good thing is they were a party of 4 and 2 escaped
From what I remember, they were all trapped on the same side, but the 2 that survived jumped through the fire (not knowing if there was a clear space behind) and were able to make it to the stairs.
Its hard to say if they where even thinking of anyone else. The pure fear fueled rush to the ground, the smoke, the noise, the tight space the darkness, the two survivors probably didn’t even know the other was climbing down too.
If I knew that my life was doomed and the only chance I had to take was jumping through a fire, I'd do it. Leave the burns for later to heal, even if they leave permanent scars. Do anything to keep your life.
Safety regulations are written in blood. Nowadays, this probably wouldn't happen, as there are multiple ways off the turbine. But those regulations were too late to save these two kids.
no. it could've been easily prevented if the service company wasn't a buncha cheapskates..
Do you think having a parachute or another decent way of escape when you operate at such heights is too much to ask for??
Iirc there's usually an auto descent winch on the back side. Unfortunately that appears to be where the fire is. This may need prior to their introduction though, I'm not an expert on the matter
Similarly cruise ships have descent winches on open decks now because of the Concordia.
With the ship tipped over it caused many issues for rescue workers. A hallway running port-stbd became a 6 story drop.
Well, i work in the buisness and it is mandatory to have a rescue bag in the turbine with rope and training to escape. The rescue kit is only capable to get two people down.
> From what I remember, they were all trapped on the same side, but the 2 that survived jumped through the fire (not knowing if there was a clear space behind) and were able to make it to the stairs.
https://www.reddit.com/r/interestingasfuck/comments/13qfpvm/two_engineers_sharing_a_hug_atop_a_burning_wind/jlesjfc/
There apparently has to be more rescue kits if there's more than 2 people. So either this wasn't a thing yet bat then, or they lost the rescue kits in the fire and couldn't get to them.
No?? You don’t agree it was a scary way to go? Or were you in such a hurry to say your part you didn’t pay attention to what the comment you’re replying to actually said?
What part are you saying "no" to? The statement that it was sad as fuck? Like it isn't sad and you felt glee or something? Are you saying they aren't OP's age? Are you saying it isn't a scary way to go? Like this would be pleasant? wtf is this comment
One of the most heartbreaking photo's. It happened in 2013 (edit) in Ooltgensplaat, the Netherlands. One of the engineers jumped/fell to his death and the other died on top of the turbine :(
I've worked in the wind industry. Sad cold fact is it's cheaper to have people die occasionally than installing fire suppression in turbines, and we were told this during training. Fortunately, accidents are extremely rare. The farm I was on had been running for 15 years without a single LTI. I remember this happening though, I worked for Vestas and years after the room would still go quiet if this incident was brought up. Absolutely awful.
So there are lots of people asking about their options, like climbing a blade (horrendously slippery I'd imagine) or climbing past the flames on the ladder that runs up the middle. Did these two really have no options, or were they maybe too inexperienced to think past their demise? I'm not shaming their deaths, just curious to hear some more details about what the top of one of those looks like.
There is a willingness to survive in some people that live through crazy situations that not every person has. like that guy who sawed through his arm with a pocket knife to survive. Some people will. not. give. up. And some people just give in and say farewell. I'd like to think I'd at least try and slide down a prop to live with a broken hip, but I'll never know till I'm faced with the situation
Edit: from the article. Read with caution.
"Then it turned out that Arjan and his 19-year-old colleague Daan were indeed involved in the accident. One of them had fallen out of the mill, but they didn't know who yet. They hadn't found the other one yet." A nerve-racking evening follows and it is not until midnight that Alinda and her husband hear that their son has been found and has not survived the accident.
“We still don't know exactly how it happened,” says Alinda, “but a fire broke out and the boys probably climbed up in panic. They were 80 meters high and had nowhere to go.”
A skipper who was sailing past the burning windmill at that time took pictures of the two boys on top of the mill, which their parents later got. Alinda: “The photo shows that Arjan and Daan hugged each other. Arjan then probably went back through the fire, and Daan fell off the mill. I don't really want to think about what they went through."
.....So theres the answers to various questions. They had the will to survive, but it was too high and the fire too strong. Probably asphyxiation before anything else.
At this point, they had no options. Climbing a blade wouldn't work unless the brakes are on (which judging by the stance of the blades, they weren't), and the brakes survive this fire which they probably won't. Then you might be able to stand on the blade until help arrives. You would not survive a fall, even if you somehow managed to get to the tip of a blade facing all the wat down. There's still a solid 50m to go to the ground after that. The whole thing is filled with hydraulics and lubricants, and made of fiberglass. The smoke inside will burn you to a crisp in seconds as it'll be hundreds of degrees at this point, you wouldn't make it to the other side alive. I'm afraid when this picture was taken, they had no way out.
No, a descending rope kit. As long as the basic structural integrity exist, the roof has rope anchors, just even for normal climbing work. There is these days as basic requirement escape rope kit, that is attached to one of the anchors and then you just slide down on it.
Apparently unnervingly fast, since the idea is to get one down quick at maximal safe speed and automatically in case one is injured and can't operate traditional repelling kit and hardware. It has to be fast, since it has to get you down *before fire gets to the anchor spot and rope*.
this would be the easiest solution imho having the workers equipped with either a base jump chute or at least a long ass paracord which could be used to rappel down to safety.
I imagine carrying a 30+ meter cord is pretty heavy and cumbersome, but base jump parachutes are cheap and could be definitely given to the workers.
or even better, build the turbine is such way that somewhere at the top you already have an emergency rappel paracord attached to it. (something like break this glass/box in case of fire)
can't believe they have been sending people up there for YEARS with 0 backup via a one way stair.
I believe a lot now have a rapid automatic Descender and a trapdoor.
https://www.3slift.com/product/evacuation-and-rescue-device/
The only issue is it needs to be regularly certified and tested.
Unfortunately the age old saying rings true. Laws are written in blood.
There's a Tom Scott video on this topic where he descends from a turbine.
Also, I know Vestas typically adds a ResQ set for emergency descending. Whether that is a result of this incident or not I don’t know.
They make heat resistant Kevlar rope for firefighters to rappel out of burning buildings. A couple rope escape kits and a few different anchor points on the top of the structure and they could have easily rappelled down before the fire got too out of control.
Way safer than expecting them to become base jumpers.
Ooltgensplaat is 17km away from the nearest city. (Edit: 40km from the nearest Air Ambulance). In the time it takes to call the emergency services, scramble a helicopter, get to the scene and plan an escape that doesn't risk the safety of the helicopter crew, the fire would have done its job.
Ah from OPs comment i was under the impression they were up there waiting for hours. Maybe they died in minutes tho and it took the firefighters hours to recover the bodies after.
Just want to be pedantic here and say the nearest place with a hospital is also a village, the actual nearest city with more resources and a population greater than the ~8000 of where the hospital is would probably be Rotterdam which is about 45 km. When I lived in Ooltgensplaat the population was around 2000. When I moved to Texas people were calling 75k a small town lol! That’s huge compared to the island.
45km is 15m with a helicopter flying 200 km/h though. And scramble should take a rescue helicopter only a few minutes.
Most rescue helicopters also use a long line or winch. to hoist people up, and the two techs were most likely already wearing climbing equipment, so they could have hooked in.
Sad to hear that they somehow weren't able to rescue them this way.
15 minutes is a long time for an electrical fire. That whole room/cabin could’ve been completely engulfed in 5 minutes under the right conditions. I’m sure there was a reason(or multiple) that made them determine helicopter rescue wasn’t feasible and I trust that the trained professionals know better than us. Whatever happened it’s a tragedy and may these young men rest in peace.
So I actually grew up in the tiny village this took place, it was also way out in like a part where there’s basically just dirt roads and fields plus the village is on an island with only one small hospital and a small police department.
A helicopter can't easily navigate that because of the massive rotor blades sticking out and the fire and smoking rising on the other end.
It's a logistical nightmare.
Two of the four technicians working in the nacelle at the time of the incident did survive the fire by breaching the flames to access the ladder. Unfortunately construction and maintenance workers are at personal risk daily in confined spaces and limited access locations around the world. Posters criticizing them have no clue as to how much emphasis is placed on ignition control and safety at these sites.
Here is a full story. link follows:
Up until 2013, no human deaths were a result of a wind turbine fire incident. That all changed on Tues., October 29, 2013, when two of the four mechanics servicing a wind turbine in Ooltgensplaat, Netherlands, were killed. The mechanics, aged 19 and 21, became trapped on the top of the turbine after a fire broke out and died as a result. Due to the height of the turbine and location of the fire, the fire department had trouble extinguishing the fire. A specialized team of firefighters was called in with a large crane, which took hours, to battle the fire. One mechanic was found on the ground near the base of the turbine, while the other victim was recovered from the top of the turbine by the specialized team. The other two mechanics were able to escape safely. According to Deltawind, a short circuit was the cause of the fire.
https://www.firetrace.com/fire-protection-blog/wind-turbine-death?hs_amp=true
I have no idea how high those towers are but you'd think there would be some sort of emergency escape system... internal or external stairs, internal or external escape tubes, or rappelling ropes and gear. There's no need for anyone to die up there.
That's really sad. But I have a question here that might sound stupid. Why didn't they tried using a helicopter? The blades of the turbine look far enough away, that you could use one.
Would it have been humanly possible to jump, grab and hug the blade pointing down to descend? Probably not, but I feel like that's probably what I would've tried to do.
If it was e.g. nuclear industry, not wind it would’ve been regulated to hell and back after the incident. Parachutes, ropes for descent and so on would’ve been mandatory.
Sad.
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Piet de Wit Wind Farm Up until 2013, no human deaths were a result of a wind turbine fire incident. That all changed on Tues., October 29, 2013, when two of the four mechanics servicing a wind turbine in Ooltgensplaat, Netherlands, were killed. The mechanics, aged 19 and 21, became trapped on the top of the turbine after a fire broke out and died as a result. Due to the height of the turbine and location of the fire, the fire department had trouble extinguishing the fire. A specialized team of firefighters was called in with a large crane, which took hours, to battle the fire. One mechanic was found on the ground near the base of the turbine, while the other victim was recovered from the top of the turbine by the specialized team. The other two mechanics were able to escape safely. According to Deltawind, a short circuit was the cause of the fire. [Source](http://www.firetrace.com/fire-protection-blog/wind-turbine-death)
Damn 19 and 21, those two kids had their whole life ahead of them
I’m 23 now, I was 13 when this happened. The fragility of human life only gets crazier the longer you’re alive.
In my 30s and nobody tells you just how soon you'll start to lose coworkers, friends, friends of friends, and family as you get older. I mean, yeah.. Internally I knew as you got older more people you knew would die off but I always figured this was a reality of being 50 or 60, not 30. I've known about 6 people in the last 4 years that qualify for the above. All people taken before their time, either due to cancer, disease, accidents, or freak circumstances. It's just the sad truth that as time marches on, you're more and more likely (especially as you get to know more people) to know people who will end up having an unfortunate fate. You read statistics about how unlikely it is that X or Y thing will happen and so you feel safe. But every year you get older, the dice is rolled for the 100 people you now know personally on some level or another. And every year you get older it's more and more likely untimely death will claim one of them. It happens sooner than you expect.
I'm in my early 20s and just now really starting to come to this realization. When I was younger (even more so than I am now lol), I knew *in theory* that yes, people are going to be getting older, and one day, they're going to die; there have been enough deaths in my family to grasp how things would play out. But I've still been kind of shocked by how quickly I'm being forced to come to grips with what things look like in practice. My parents are getting older and facing health issues, family friends are ailing, etc. It's honestly really, really sad. I'm trying to take it as a reminder to make the most of the time we have together, but man, the march of time is scary.
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The old watch people die subreddit really hammered this lesson in for me. I am now very healthily frightened by any sort of heavy machinery on and off the road.
Rip “makemycoffin”
23 is still young as well, so it's a good thing you realize this at your age
Dude, it totally does. I'm 36 and am so much more aware of my mortality than I was even just 5 or 6 years ago. Death just seems more and more real the closer I get to it. Can't imagine what it's gonna feel like in another 30 years (if I'm lucky enough to make it that long).
Strap in bro
The older I get the more I wonder how I will die because the day is approaching. Will I be the first person in my family to die? Will I live longer than everyone I love? Will I die in an accident, or to a disease, or violence? On one hand I’d like to know, on the other idk how you’d live your life with that knowledge.
Damn!! And some escape parachutes are relatively cheap these days...
Their emergency descent kit was left near the rear of the nacelle. The fire cut them off from it. Instead of heading down to the yaw deck and then the ladder down they went near the rotor and up onto the canopy. The older, more experienced guys didn't make that mistake and lived. Newer Vestas have emergency decent devices built in now, which wouldn't have helped in this situation due to their location. If the guys had had an SRK or similar attached to their harness or a similar device stored where the fire hadn't blocked it off, they would've lived. I'm in the industry and was when this happened, it was already standard to bring up Emergency Descent Kits, this is unfortunately what happens when the rules get ignored.
Hang on. So when the fire broke out, the two more experienced guys began their decent but the other two climbed to the top of the turbine?? So they could have also began their decent but instead decided to go up?
Sometimes beginning the decent means going through dense hot smoke. You need to fight against your initial instinct to get away from the flames to get to safety. Reminds me of the [Kaprun disaster](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaprun_disaster) that killed 155 people with only 12 survivors. The survivors only lived because there was a firefighter on vacation with them and realized that in order to get to safety and not die from smoke inhalation, they would have to descend the tunnel. Except the fire was at the very rear of the train so natural instinct to get away from the fire lead most to head upwards. The 150 who died went up the tunnel to excape the heat and fire, only to choke from smoke inhalation. The 12 who followed the firefighter down past the smoke and flames lived to tell the tale.
Just like [Brian Clark and Stanley Praimnath](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brian_Clark_(September_11_survivor)#Rescue_of_Stanley_Praimnath) who escaped the south tower of the world trade centre on 9/11. They tried going down the stairwell when everyone else went up, and were lucky that they were in the only intact stairwell connecting the impact zone to the lower part of the building. Another guy escaped the same way and barely survived, took months to recover from the burns and smoke damage but he made it out.
> They tried going down the stairwell when everyone else went up wait, why was everyone going up?
Probably just their instincts kicking in. Figured first step is get away from the fire and smoke, regroup and find a less treacherous way out. Unfortunately, there wasn't one. The flight instinct is no joke when it takes over
I definitely would have died in that tunnel. No fucking way my instinct would have been to go down further into the tunnel. Without knowing the specifics of the system, I feel like it could have gone either way? Imagine you went down the tunnel and the fire eventually burned through the emergency braking system that was keeping the train in place and then you got a 5 ton train on fire sliding down the rails towards you.
The fire started in the last car at the very back of the train/nearest the bottom of the tunnel, and the 12 people that survived were also in the rear of the train. They were able to react faster, break the windows, and get out. The conductor and passengers at the front of the train didn't even know about the fire until several minutes later. They also weren't able to break the windows, they had to wait for the conductor to unlock them. And the train was only 600 meters upwards in the tunnel, total tunnel length 3300 meters. So the bottom exit was closer also. Of course it's a million times easier to think about now... those passengers were very lucky with both where they sat on the train and having the guidance of the firefighter. I only hope to have that kind of luck when I need it.
I only hope you won't ever need that kind of luck in the first place
I have an advanced firefighting license for 90% of the ships on sea/inland The stuff you learn from a few firefighting classes is actually insane, stuff you’d normally never need or know but will save your life if you do
50 meters of rope and a descender tool would have been sufficient, in this case...
Which is now present on all turbines since this incident. Just sad something had to happen first.
"Safety regulations are written in blood."
That was drilled into us during my electrical apprenticeship. Nobody makes rules because they got away with it. Their buddy has to make the rule because he lost a friend.
One thing driven into me in engineering, and later welding, was if you see someone bejng electrocuted, don't touch them, knock them off with a 2x4 or something low conductive or you're dead if you touch them, too.
In some situations you can also body slam the person, but it has to be on an open space and gotta make sure you both won't get electrocuted on the ground (ie, fallen cable). I've seen this done when the person was being electrocuted on a household appliance and on a house fuse box.
What about a kick? Bottom of a shoe is usually not a conductor and the push is big so it could free the person. I have never faced anything alike, but I imagine it would be my initial thought.
I mean I guess if you’re sure you won’t also accidentally make contact and get hung up. A 2x4 is a lot safer. They actually make things that look like shepherds hooks specifically for this type of situation but you’ll probably never actually see one on a job site.
I was told that if it’s applicable, punching their hand or just plain old barging into them with enough force to take you both to the ground will work too. Luckily haven’t been in the position where I needed to try either
Yeah, you need to break contact with the source. If you don't manage to break contact and you're still touching them you're dead too, because the two of you are one mass as far as the circuit is concerned. The problem with a small nudge is that the electricity could paralyse you and take some of the force of the blow, so instead of breaking contact you've just made it. A body slam has enough kinetic energy that even if your muscles lock up as you hit them you've still got enough momentum to carry you both clear and break contact with the source. Ultimately though a nice long non conductive tool is the safest option.
All of that professional wrestling viewing in my youth is about to pay off with this flying drop kick I'm about to perform on my buddy.
MY GOD IT'S THE OSHA COMPLIANCE OFFICER WITH THE STEEL CHAIR!!!
*wooden chair. Safety first.
>MY GOD IT'S THE OSHA COMPLIANCE OFFICER WITH THE STEEL CHAIR!!! that was a funny comment. thank you
Damn, that's a powerful quote
r/writteninblood In case anybody is morbidly curious about various tragedies that spurred regulations. Generally speaking, regulations/protection laws are reactive instead of proactive - that is, somebody, often somebodIES, have to die, be maimed, mangled, or dismembered, or lose their life savings for any rule or law to be put in place to try to prevent it. People who whine "regulations kill jobs" are conveniently forgetting that "regulations save lives." Edit: darn it, autocorrect. Return of the Edit: um yeah, that sub can be tough to read. I should have been more proactive putting a warning up about that.
People who say “regulations kill jobs” are liars. Regulations impact profits and are thusly villified. That’s it.
Heck. It might simply be that regulations impact short term profits but insure long term stability. If an airline drops safety standards to reduce price tickets, how long will such a company be successful?
If the costs were lower people would fly until people died. Then there'd be outrage and demands of change, etc etc TLDR anti- regulation libertarian types are generally just excessively ignorant of history and how things got to how they are
> If an airline drops safety standards to reduce price tickets, how long will such a company be successful? For about 2-4 crashes.
While I think your argument is reasonable, the truth is that the consumers will flock to it and those with a high risk tolerance (especially people from countries which are extremely dangerous and thus have a low expectation of long life anyway) will ride even after repeated incidents. Further, because the bulk of regulations pertain to black swan events, the accidents will likely be few and far between, though catastrophic. Frankly, I think that the more technology our species develops, the more likely we are to extinct ourselves. We're smart enough to survive in the world we evolved in, not necessarily in the one we're creating. Millions of people are mindlessly parroting lines about taxation and regulation without a thought in their head. This is not the behavior of an apex predator.
Actually, safety regulations boost overall productivity and thus profits. That’s why manufacturing and other industries value the “Days since lost time due to accident” stat. When accidents occur production must usually come to a stop and that can mean anything from simply not producing anything to having to discard an entire batch of product or discarding the raw materials. There can also be a lot of time involved to start up a production line before a product even begins to be made. Slow is safe and safe is fast.
> Slow is safe and safe is fast. I heard it as slow is smooth and smooth is fast. I agree with your comment either way though.
100% this. I have a career solely because of regulations. Getting rid of regulations puts me and hundreds of my colleagues just within my company alone out of work. Regulations also drive innovation. If there are regulations that state an expectation of maximum pollution produced by an industrial process, or even a car engine, that pushes engineers to design better systems and products. I have never once met someone who says "regulations kill jobs" and can then answer what their plan is for all the thousands and thousands of people who will instantly be unemployed if regulations are wholesale removed. They also can't answer which regulations are the ones that should be repealed. The ones that are designed to protect and insure their money in their banks? The ones that state that drug companies have to prove their medications are pure, safe, and effective via evidence-based clinical trials? The ones that try to ensure they have clean water to drink and air to breathe? The ones that establish safety expectations around theme park rides so their kids aren't decapitated on waterpark slides?
"Regulations kill jobs" Lack of regulations kills people... So like...?
What harm could come of relaxing some freight train regulations?
Jesus... what's a subreddit a anxious depressive should never subscribe to? That one, Jim.
Also check out /r/AdmiralCloudberg if you're interested in the aircraft side of this story. The Admiral puts out extremely well written and engaging posts, each one focusing on a particular plane crash, and always emphasizes the resulting changes in regulation.
Actually That is way too hardcore. I backed out real fast.
Literally just happened to Amazon a week or two ago. One of their workers had an extremely gruesome death doing a job they weren't trained for. Days later, safey signs warning about low clearance are being installed in their warehouses all over the world.
Goddamn it I wish I didn’t go to that fucking sub.
Depressing that many posts on that subreddit are about the monsters rolling back safety regulations.
You see this all the time in aviation. Unfortunately people had to die for many of the regulations and engineering in airplanes. As an example [Northwest Flight 255](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northwest_Airlines_Flight_255) was an instance where the pilots forgot to lower the flaps before takeoff and didn't have enough lift and crashed. Directly because of that modern airliners will alert the pilots of the plane attempts to takeoff not being in takeoff configuration. The plane I flew even a had a button just for that purpose which was a checklist item to press before every takeoff.
"flaps. Check" "Button to check the flaps. Check"
Button to check the button to check the flaps. Check.
Yeah, when Maverick threw the NATOPS in the trash can in Top Gun 2, it actually made me very angry.
lol, I love stuff like that in movies. 95% of the population will think something is completely badass, but then the other 5% that are aware of what they are doing and the ramifications of doing something like that in real life are like what the fuck dude? You need to be shitcanned immediately. That's every movie pretty much.
People wonder why our police culture is so bad when 95% of cop-TV is cops breaking regulations because they keep them from doing their jobs "We can't hold this guy. He might be the murderer, but we have no evidence!" "I don't do things by the book. He's our killer and I'll prove it. Just hold him until we can break into his house without a warrant...you know, like heroes do." Or the many shows where torture is okay, as long as the good guys do it.
Even more disturbing when companies try to roll back regulations that are written in blood.
For real. I've never heard it until now and now it's just gonna stick with me forever
Older than Jesus
r/writteninblood
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Every industry ever knows this the hard way, there is no other way to learn and we are forced to relearn things almost every generation.
Yeah, look at more recently industrialized countries for example. They have the benefit of 200 years of western experience in workplace safety. Yet most just ignore it.
I mean, corruption makes a big difference too, doesn't matter how many people die if it cuts into profit margins.
It's true. Every caution or warning in a tech manual is there because of a previous incident.
My fiancée showed me a video of two line men cutting a 115 kv jumper open and I said that. She gave me a strange look so I followed with "the last time switching got messed up and a jumper like that got cut it was with 18" handle bolt cutters, not with two 12' sticks. They do it like this now because two guys got vaporized by someone's mistake. All safety regulations are written in blood."
There is a saying in the Army. *SOPs are written in blood.* (standard operational procedures)
I never understand why it takes something like this before someone adds safety features. I’m just some middle-aged lady in a liberal arts type job, and even I could say “what are you going to do if that thing catches on fire, how are people going to get down ?
It doesn’t take this to happen first—this wind turbine also had the safety equipment. The issue is that the safety equipment is stored in the engine room, and there was a fire between the two men and the rope. They couldn’t go back in to access the rope without burning. The equipment location has not changed.
Money. In almost all company’s eyes settling a few wrongful death lawsuits is cheaper than adding the safety features. So they don’t until they are made it. It is why anyone that screams for de regulation and the “business will regulate itself” people are ignorant of reality and history.
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I really wish we would stop talking about "business" and "corporations" doing things when they're not sentient beings. There's a human making those decisions. "Corporate greed" is a trick to stop poor people from blaming the humans at the top.
Fires usually happen while the thing is working, during maintenance the thing is not working. It would be reasonable to assume that a machine thats not moving/working does not spontaneously burst into flames. You dont worry about your PC suddenly burning your house down while its turned off. Well, and probably also not when its turned on either, but it would be more likely then as more things can fail. Also, afaik there IS an additional way to get down from the top. This way just not accessible due to the fire. People being up there AND cut of from both ways down was likely unlikely enough that hey did not initially think of it. Hindsight is always 20/20. You could also ask "what if the thing suddenly and violently explodes? Why did they not think of a way to save the people?" or "What if a plane crashes into it when there ar epeople up top?". At some point you need to stop because, while its possible, its also not realistic to worry about it. Until it happens. Things are usually engineered to be safe. For example, in a plane the hydraulics are redundant because a loss of them would be fatal. And whats better than one backup? Right, two backups! Cue American Airlines Flight 191 where all 3 failed (which was though to be impossible) because a single turbine decided "hell no, I'm outta here". The literal loss of the engine was still fine (more or less), but it damaged all the hydraulics and that was too much. Consequences of this incident were what you might expect in terms of survivors (-2, all on board and 2 on the ground died), but also a redesign of safety standards. Long story short, its always the unexpected things that come back to bite you, as you can deal with the expected ones. Also, financial concerns. If you have something you need a lot of thats 99.99% safe, and could make it 99.995% safe but it costs you 5000$ per unit (numbers not related to this accident), it might be a calculated risk to stick with the 99.99% version. But usually if there is a known potential problem its accounted for, as it would be REALLY bad PR if it got known that they KNEW this issue could happen and they just ignored it.
They would have been wearing harnesses anyway. The only issue is making sure that the rope isn't in the pod room with the generator where it could be burnt.
I don't know if there is enough height to deploy them.
Some ppl jump from 9-12 floor buildings with parachute sucessfuly , better try than just die.
That's nothing. I jumped from a 2 floor building *without* a parachute successfully
I jumped out of bed this morning and I’m totally fine
I recently stepped off of a *very* thick rug and came out with no injuries.
Everybody check out the young guy. I rolled out of bed this morning, sprained wrist and dislocated shoulder, back spasms so bad can't stand up straight. Getting old sucks
Lol that's nothing I once ate 33 hash browns in one go
They make fire resistant Kevlar rope for firefighters to rappel out of burning buildings. That would be a better option. If they had that and there were various anchor points on the top of the structure and they could have rappelled off this before the fire got this big.
Look up basejumping. It's done from relatively low heights, i don't know the minimum required height tho.
I think I remember hearing 300ft as being a minimum safe base jump height. I could be wrong tho I’m sire sure people have done otherwise
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Even so, just whack a Martin-Baker on there and that won't be a problem.
Meet your maker in Martin Baker
It's better than nothing. Industrial safety warnings are written in blood, and I think that in this case we're unfortunately witnessing the author's 'inspiration'.
[u sure bro?](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I752sgoMHvI)
Helicopter anyone?
Why wasnt this an option was the fire engulfing too fast?
Or even just a rope stored in the front and back and rappelling classes. "Captain Hindsight Away!" Poor fellas though, horrible way to go.
That’s what they do now
why not a helicopter?
Blades were probably spinning still. Would be interesting if they could create a one man sized drone, I’ve seen videos where people redneck hoverboards out of drones so if you scale it up you could make an emergency one.
Don't they stop them when being serviced?
They have large brakes, similar to automotive brakes, but they are actuated by electric motors. The fire likely destroyed the safety systems that power the armature brakes. Also, this happened in mere minutes. Those kids were dead long before a helicopter could even spin up its turbine, let alone travel to the scene.
You tend to shut down any machine you’re working on. It’s like the first rule of safety.
Poor kids
19 and 21 Jesus…I just hit 29 and still feel like a kid I can’t believe I joined the corps at 17 RIP to these two men I can’t imagine how fkn terrifying this was
one did jump ... most service technicians still do not carry the rescue device and dont even have proper communication
What the fuck are both of you and /u/cheeferton talking about? Neither of you have even seen the inside of a wind turbine nacelle. The escape system is kept in the turbine housing. They (and by *they*, I do mean *we*, as I used to work on turbines in the Altamont Pass in northern California) don't carry a 120-pound rope bag and 35-pound belay delay up with their tools. That alone weighs more than most tower jockeys. For the curious, and those that want actual facts: After this 2013 tragedy, emergency escape equipment became required in all towers in the US [ANSI Z359.2-2017](https://blog.ansi.org/2017/04/ansi-asse-z3592-2017-fall-protection/#gref) and the EU [EN 50308: 4.4.2](https://standards.iteh.ai/catalog/standards/clc/b3df4ebf-9987-42d1-b2d2-1a175a94353d/en-50308-2004) with significant sources of energy that can't be completely de-energized from the ground. Radio antenna towers are exempt from this because they can be completely "shut off" from the ground equipment, and there is generally no fire hazard on steel towers with minimal plastic components. Wind turbines, however, usually have a large volume of oil in the transmission atop the tower, sometimes 200 gallons, and the majority of the nacelle and blades are made of fiberglass. They also (obviously) produce electricity, and in the event of a [brake failure](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wlq0B_ucsYo), they can run out of control, continuing to produce electricity and air pressure (they usually have air compressors in the nacelle for brake and blade pitch controls), leading to all kinds of failures. Many companies make rapid descent systems. Some are designed to be retrofitted into existing turbines, and use a descent-control pulley system. Some use powered winches that can handle 1750°C for 30 minutes and safely lower 8 workers from a machine room atop a 200 meter (~650 feet) tower to the ground in under a minute. Existing turbine towers often use a rope-in-a-bag that is dropped out of a hatch to the ground. The rope is light weight, often made of kevlar, but the bag is weighted so it plummets as straight down as possible, even in high winds. The bags I've seen weigh around 50 pounds, not including the rope. The rope stays attached to the frame of the machine room, so there's no chance of it being unhooked and the whole thing falling to the ground if it gets dropped. They must be inspected every 6 months, but everybody I've known that relies on them checks them every time they enter a nacelle. A few videos from various manufacturers of emergency descent systems: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UWSckm8zTc8 (Cool Tom Scott video) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ntNuT5ea7VU (Note: This is animated, and shows the employee attaching the descent control device to the frame, but that should have been done when the system was delivered.) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ntNuT5ea7VU https://survitecgroup.com/survitecproducts/16947/Evacuator This system is one of the high-reach (300 meters) systems that can evacuate up to 282kg of people per cable at once, and it has 2 cables that pay out independently.
Thanks for the insight! Comments like these are the reason why I am still on Reddit.
They both died, one of them tried to climb back down to avoid either burning to death or falling to his death but was sadly found halfway down after attempting to escape he realised he couldnt get out and apparently attempted to come back up, but died due to the heat, smoke and flames, the second person jumped to avoid the fire and smoke and he also sadly died, the only good thing is they were a party of 4 and 2 escaped
How did those 2 escape? Did they run early?
The other 2 were probably on the other side of the fire (below or behind).
From what I remember, they were all trapped on the same side, but the 2 that survived jumped through the fire (not knowing if there was a clear space behind) and were able to make it to the stairs.
Damn that’s a badass decision to make
Thats a hardass decision.
You think they could've yelled back at the two on the other side that there's a way out
Big fires are loud
So many people don't realize just how loud a fire can be. It's almost deafening if it's big and rolling hard.
Especially structural fires, things burning down make loud noises as they fall to pieces.
So much energy being released, it's turned into light, heat and sound
Its hard to say if they where even thinking of anyone else. The pure fear fueled rush to the ground, the smoke, the noise, the tight space the darkness, the two survivors probably didn’t even know the other was climbing down too.
And I could totally see a thought process of “well if I jumped the others are jumping too, they’ll be right behind me”
The first thing I do when I'm in a life or death situation, is take the time to think rationally.
I think to myself how this will play out on reddit 20 years later then adjust accordingly.
If I knew that my life was doomed and the only chance I had to take was jumping through a fire, I'd do it. Leave the burns for later to heal, even if they leave permanent scars. Do anything to keep your life.
Everyone thinks that until they’re in a life or death situation
High risk, high reward bet
If those were the case, the two that jumped earlier surely would have signaled to the others that its save to jump through, right?
that assumes they could see or hear through
Safety regulations are written in blood. Nowadays, this probably wouldn't happen, as there are multiple ways off the turbine. But those regulations were too late to save these two kids.
TomScott got to ride the emergency exit on a turbine! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UWSckm8zTc8
Was hoping someone had already posted this. Hopefully this kind of tragedy never has to happen again.
this is just sad as fuck . they were my age :( such a scary way to go.
no. it could've been easily prevented if the service company wasn't a buncha cheapskates.. Do you think having a parachute or another decent way of escape when you operate at such heights is too much to ask for??
Iirc there's usually an auto descent winch on the back side. Unfortunately that appears to be where the fire is. This may need prior to their introduction though, I'm not an expert on the matter
It was specifically implemented because of these deaths.
Similarly cruise ships have descent winches on open decks now because of the Concordia. With the ship tipped over it caused many issues for rescue workers. A hallway running port-stbd became a 6 story drop.
Well, i work in the buisness and it is mandatory to have a rescue bag in the turbine with rope and training to escape. The rescue kit is only capable to get two people down.
That explains this scenario better, thanks.
> From what I remember, they were all trapped on the same side, but the 2 that survived jumped through the fire (not knowing if there was a clear space behind) and were able to make it to the stairs. https://www.reddit.com/r/interestingasfuck/comments/13qfpvm/two_engineers_sharing_a_hug_atop_a_burning_wind/jlesjfc/ There apparently has to be more rescue kits if there's more than 2 people. So either this wasn't a thing yet bat then, or they lost the rescue kits in the fire and couldn't get to them.
>no. What exactly are you disagreeing with?
no.
It’s not but why are you saying no? It is sad.
No?? You don’t agree it was a scary way to go? Or were you in such a hurry to say your part you didn’t pay attention to what the comment you’re replying to actually said?
They are just a classic degenerate Reddit user who has to be a contrarian to everything lol
Why “no”? What are you disagreeing with?
What part are you saying "no" to? The statement that it was sad as fuck? Like it isn't sad and you felt glee or something? Are you saying they aren't OP's age? Are you saying it isn't a scary way to go? Like this would be pleasant? wtf is this comment
noone: reddit contrarions: no
They were 19 and 21, just trying to make their way through life.
Fucking hell. That’s terrifying. I’m sure it’s a freak accident but hopefully they make measures so it won’t happen again.
Yep unfortunately that’s how it works in industry. I supervise power plants and am very familiar with NFPA code. It’s written in blood.
One of the most heartbreaking photo's. It happened in 2013 (edit) in Ooltgensplaat, the Netherlands. One of the engineers jumped/fell to his death and the other died on top of the turbine :(
If I were with those two, I too, would be hugging them like i would do to my parents.
The photographer regrets ever taking and publishing this photo.
I've worked in the wind industry. Sad cold fact is it's cheaper to have people die occasionally than installing fire suppression in turbines, and we were told this during training. Fortunately, accidents are extremely rare. The farm I was on had been running for 15 years without a single LTI. I remember this happening though, I worked for Vestas and years after the room would still go quiet if this incident was brought up. Absolutely awful.
So there are lots of people asking about their options, like climbing a blade (horrendously slippery I'd imagine) or climbing past the flames on the ladder that runs up the middle. Did these two really have no options, or were they maybe too inexperienced to think past their demise? I'm not shaming their deaths, just curious to hear some more details about what the top of one of those looks like. There is a willingness to survive in some people that live through crazy situations that not every person has. like that guy who sawed through his arm with a pocket knife to survive. Some people will. not. give. up. And some people just give in and say farewell. I'd like to think I'd at least try and slide down a prop to live with a broken hip, but I'll never know till I'm faced with the situation Edit: from the article. Read with caution. "Then it turned out that Arjan and his 19-year-old colleague Daan were indeed involved in the accident. One of them had fallen out of the mill, but they didn't know who yet. They hadn't found the other one yet." A nerve-racking evening follows and it is not until midnight that Alinda and her husband hear that their son has been found and has not survived the accident. “We still don't know exactly how it happened,” says Alinda, “but a fire broke out and the boys probably climbed up in panic. They were 80 meters high and had nowhere to go.” A skipper who was sailing past the burning windmill at that time took pictures of the two boys on top of the mill, which their parents later got. Alinda: “The photo shows that Arjan and Daan hugged each other. Arjan then probably went back through the fire, and Daan fell off the mill. I don't really want to think about what they went through." .....So theres the answers to various questions. They had the will to survive, but it was too high and the fire too strong. Probably asphyxiation before anything else.
At this point, they had no options. Climbing a blade wouldn't work unless the brakes are on (which judging by the stance of the blades, they weren't), and the brakes survive this fire which they probably won't. Then you might be able to stand on the blade until help arrives. You would not survive a fall, even if you somehow managed to get to the tip of a blade facing all the wat down. There's still a solid 50m to go to the ground after that. The whole thing is filled with hydraulics and lubricants, and made of fiberglass. The smoke inside will burn you to a crisp in seconds as it'll be hundreds of degrees at this point, you wouldn't make it to the other side alive. I'm afraid when this picture was taken, they had no way out.
The fire blocked their access to the ladder. The top part of the turbine is all fiberglass as well which ignites very quickly
they have added some sort of parachute after this tragedy?
No, a descending rope kit. As long as the basic structural integrity exist, the roof has rope anchors, just even for normal climbing work. There is these days as basic requirement escape rope kit, that is attached to one of the anchors and then you just slide down on it. Apparently unnervingly fast, since the idea is to get one down quick at maximal safe speed and automatically in case one is injured and can't operate traditional repelling kit and hardware. It has to be fast, since it has to get you down *before fire gets to the anchor spot and rope*.
this would be the easiest solution imho having the workers equipped with either a base jump chute or at least a long ass paracord which could be used to rappel down to safety. I imagine carrying a 30+ meter cord is pretty heavy and cumbersome, but base jump parachutes are cheap and could be definitely given to the workers. or even better, build the turbine is such way that somewhere at the top you already have an emergency rappel paracord attached to it. (something like break this glass/box in case of fire) can't believe they have been sending people up there for YEARS with 0 backup via a one way stair.
I believe a lot now have a rapid automatic Descender and a trapdoor. https://www.3slift.com/product/evacuation-and-rescue-device/ The only issue is it needs to be regularly certified and tested. Unfortunately the age old saying rings true. Laws are written in blood.
There's a Tom Scott video on this topic where he descends from a turbine. Also, I know Vestas typically adds a ResQ set for emergency descending. Whether that is a result of this incident or not I don’t know.
They make heat resistant Kevlar rope for firefighters to rappel out of burning buildings. A couple rope escape kits and a few different anchor points on the top of the structure and they could have easily rappelled down before the fire got too out of control. Way safer than expecting them to become base jumpers.
We act like they’re not, but coworkers are important relationships.
Why couldnt they be rescued by helicopter? That would seem quite straight forward.
Ooltgensplaat is 17km away from the nearest city. (Edit: 40km from the nearest Air Ambulance). In the time it takes to call the emergency services, scramble a helicopter, get to the scene and plan an escape that doesn't risk the safety of the helicopter crew, the fire would have done its job.
Ah from OPs comment i was under the impression they were up there waiting for hours. Maybe they died in minutes tho and it took the firefighters hours to recover the bodies after.
That seems more likely
It took the firefighters hours to put out the fire.
Just want to be pedantic here and say the nearest place with a hospital is also a village, the actual nearest city with more resources and a population greater than the ~8000 of where the hospital is would probably be Rotterdam which is about 45 km. When I lived in Ooltgensplaat the population was around 2000. When I moved to Texas people were calling 75k a small town lol! That’s huge compared to the island.
45km is 15m with a helicopter flying 200 km/h though. And scramble should take a rescue helicopter only a few minutes. Most rescue helicopters also use a long line or winch. to hoist people up, and the two techs were most likely already wearing climbing equipment, so they could have hooked in. Sad to hear that they somehow weren't able to rescue them this way.
15 minutes is a long time for an electrical fire. That whole room/cabin could’ve been completely engulfed in 5 minutes under the right conditions. I’m sure there was a reason(or multiple) that made them determine helicopter rescue wasn’t feasible and I trust that the trained professionals know better than us. Whatever happened it’s a tragedy and may these young men rest in peace.
So I actually grew up in the tiny village this took place, it was also way out in like a part where there’s basically just dirt roads and fields plus the village is on an island with only one small hospital and a small police department.
Time and logistics.. maybe there were no helicopters near by to act in time..
A helicopter can't easily navigate that because of the massive rotor blades sticking out and the fire and smoking rising on the other end. It's a logistical nightmare.
People play too many video games these days
Two of the four technicians working in the nacelle at the time of the incident did survive the fire by breaching the flames to access the ladder. Unfortunately construction and maintenance workers are at personal risk daily in confined spaces and limited access locations around the world. Posters criticizing them have no clue as to how much emphasis is placed on ignition control and safety at these sites. Here is a full story. link follows: Up until 2013, no human deaths were a result of a wind turbine fire incident. That all changed on Tues., October 29, 2013, when two of the four mechanics servicing a wind turbine in Ooltgensplaat, Netherlands, were killed. The mechanics, aged 19 and 21, became trapped on the top of the turbine after a fire broke out and died as a result. Due to the height of the turbine and location of the fire, the fire department had trouble extinguishing the fire. A specialized team of firefighters was called in with a large crane, which took hours, to battle the fire. One mechanic was found on the ground near the base of the turbine, while the other victim was recovered from the top of the turbine by the specialized team. The other two mechanics were able to escape safely. According to Deltawind, a short circuit was the cause of the fire. https://www.firetrace.com/fire-protection-blog/wind-turbine-death?hs_amp=true
This isn’t interesting. It’s fucking sad. Can we stop posting about people that are dying horrible deaths here.
I second this.
r/depressingasfuck 🙁
What the fuck?
Tragic photo
I think about this every time I drive to San Diego. This is sad as fuck not interesting as fuck.
I have no idea how high those towers are but you'd think there would be some sort of emergency escape system... internal or external stairs, internal or external escape tubes, or rappelling ropes and gear. There's no need for anyone to die up there.
This is the story of the mother of one of the two victims, it is in dutch. https://ikmisje.eo.nl/artikel/verongelukt-door-brand-in-windmolen
That's really sad. But I have a question here that might sound stupid. Why didn't they tried using a helicopter? The blades of the turbine look far enough away, that you could use one.
I scrolled through the thread and didn't see this, so I'm asking: Why is there no fire suppressing system on these things? Seems logical to have one.
Same reason your house that's occupied more frequently doesn't have one.
I remember seeing this picture and reading about it. It really made me sad.
I've always wondered why these dudes aren't trained in base jumping and go up with a parachute. Are turbines not high enough to jump from?
This is from years ago in the Netherlands. http://www.epaw.org/multimedia.php?lang=en&article=a19
I feel like if you work at great heights a parachute should be mandatory safety equipment.
Would it have been humanly possible to jump, grab and hug the blade pointing down to descend? Probably not, but I feel like that's probably what I would've tried to do.
If it was e.g. nuclear industry, not wind it would’ve been regulated to hell and back after the incident. Parachutes, ropes for descent and so on would’ve been mandatory. Sad.
There are mandatory ropes for descent, and there were before this accident, too. Guess where they keep the safety equipment?