Warning: the following post contains graphic and disturbing images. You may want to wait until after breakfast before reading.
Years ago, when I worked as a PA on one of my first “professional” film sets, the entire crew walked off due to a financial dispute with the producers. As the one PA that wasn’t 1) related to one of the above-the-line folks or 2) sleeping with one of the producers, I was told to unload the grip truck with the one remaining dolly grip–he happened to be stoned out of his gourd at 8AM.
This pothead decided it was my job to pull everything off the truck while he wheeled it onto set. When it came time for his precious dolly this dude told me to “step aside, son, and let a professional take care of it.” He rolled the dolly onto the lift, jumped off and started lowering it with the controls outside of the truck. Smart guy that he was, he forgot to lock the brakes. The dolly started to roll off the lift and towards this stoner.
I should note here that my high school motto was “a man for others.”
Without hesitation, I reached for the dolly to stop it from crushing this dude. My hand gripped the steering bar, the dolly crashed to the ground and I was launched 15 feet off the truck.
A few minutes later I woke up in a flower bed. My leg was draped over the cement lip that enclosed this flower bed. I focused on my ankle–it’s girth was equal to my head’s (for reference, my noggin is so big I can’t wear hats).
Thankfully, nothing was broken. I’ll scrub through the aftermath (they begged me not to report, they promised to pay all the bills, I almost took them to court when they refused) but the moral of this story is that you have the right to refuse unsafe work.
Me, I want to be the nice guy, I want to be the one people call “super helpful.” Instead, I end up being the guy with the bum back after I single-handedly loaded a stakebed truck with c-stands, high rollers and HMI ballasts.
Need a more vivid example? Check out these incredible Canadian workplace safety PSAs (if my story made you nauseous then these will having you barfing up last week’s Kung Pao chicken).
Be safe out there.
Tags: Commercials
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