. Now ask yourself this - if no one knew what the gear was for, why on earth were they selling it to those people?
You would be amazed what people will fly stuff with. For the short time I was the only TD in a district with 14 high schools. I only had to do stuff at my building, but occasionally I would get a
call from another high schools drama teacher to give them a
hand. I was amazed what some dad would come in with and get a
flat in the air with. Everything from boat hardware to whatever else they could
pick up. I don't know what I hate worse, flying improperly with improper hardware or flying improperly with proper hardware used improperly. Well, both suck.
There are a few ways to find people to help you rig safely. Someone with an
ETCP cert in
theatre rigging should be able to help you fly a group of flats.
ETCP riggers can be looked up on
the ETCP website. Anyone with a degree in technical direction with the proper background should be able to fly a group of flats as well as rig most theatrical scenery. Contact your local college's
theatre dept, someone should be able to help there. There are plenty of TD's on this board that don't have their
ETCP but could rig scenery.
Rigging scenery is a weird animal from what most traditional riggers deal with. I would not trust an
arena rigger with 20 years experience on the steel to rig a set of portals on a
counterweight system. Just because someone says they are a rigger does not mean they are the right kind of rigger to fly your scenery.
Scenery has to be constructed in order to take the load and to take the stress of being flown. It is the responsibility of the technical director to make sure all scenery being flown can be flown safely before a single drawing hits the shop floor. I would not expect most riggers to know how to correctly
build a piece to make sure that the places on the scenery that the points are being attached to are properly built. I would expect them to be able to get the piece up after they are given the points.