ok, I would like to take this one step further, if no one minds. I was recently working at a high school as the LD. I am technically a rigger. I have rigged shows, and have attended Mountain Rigging School, workshops with Tomcat and Applied,
etc,
etc..... I, however, feel that I do not rig enough to be proficient at it and hire a rigger whenever I am putting big stuff up in the air.
I was at the school and there was a father of a student, who is a residential construction worker (builds houses) with a few students and they were putting a $99 cable
winch that they bought at Sams Club up in the air to fly a person in the show. They were going to
bolt it to extra 2" lighting pipes that were in the show and put the pipes above the building steel. They were using standard hardware store zinc bolts and nuts and no washers to attach the
winch to holes they had drilled in the pipe.
I suggested that they hire a rigger, talked to the director and the TD, as well as the head of the department. They were convinced that this would be safe. I told them that I wanted no part of this, but suggested that they at least use grade 8 hardware and use a
winch rated at more than 150 lbs. I have no idea what they used, as I finished my design and left.
In the end, it worked. It lifted the student about 30 feet in the air and then back down.
What does everyone think about that?!?