h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I understand much of what you are saying.
I work around heat and fire on a daily basis.
Teamwork is everything.
I have a co-worker, but not a teammate.

Fortunately, there are others that I can trust and work with, including my lead man.
One thing I've learned about fire and heat: your fear can be more dangerous than the conditions.

I wish we had a comprehensive training program, but as it is right now where I work, you either learn on your own, or you go home.

Thanks for your post TR It always makes me feel good when I get a reply from a Snippet. I know what you mean about the team work, as there is no room for mistakes when your fighting a fire

You also have to watch your back, as fire can creep round you and before you know it, its there behind you
The heat can be scary, even if you are wearing a suit, being right there in it you can feel the heat!
When your on a ship, you have no-where to run form fire, so your only choice is to fight it and put it out
Smudger,

Working in the furnace room of a Die Casting factory,
we rarely get to use safety equipment.
We're supposed to use coats while cleaning the furnaces, but they are cumbersome and lead to heat exhaustion.

Working around hot metal, once you get burned a couple of times, you learn to deal with the metal as if it were alive.
It has talents and tendencies and you can get in sync with them if you pay attention.
As for fire, as I said we deal with it on a daily basis.
Only a couple of times have I had to use the extinguisher.

The worst thing I've seen happen is when one of the main furnaces spewed half it's contents out the door when some water got in the molten alloy.
There was metal everywhere and the forklift that was dumping the scrap with the water in it got stuck and it's tires were melting from the metal on the floor and on fire from the heat.
People sprang from everywhere and with a team effort, we got the forklift unstuck and the metal off the floor. It only took about thirty minutes.
And the moron who was responsible for the incident got a couple blobs of 380 alloy down the back of his shirt and pants.

Unfortunately, that moron is my main co-worker.

That sounds a bit dangerous that job WS, I liked that kind of work mind you, working at heights never bothered me either
We used to get burnt a lot when I was a welder as well, but when we used those low hydrogen welding rods, the scar stayed with you for life?

I remember once having a large chunk of molten metal land inside my boot when I was gouging out a repair! It took weeks to heal properly, as it melted my socks into the burnt skin and caused a reaction
Smudger,