Mark Mahon: Living Life on the Edge the Logger Way
WRITTEN FOR GTLA BY: RAQUEL WOOD
Mark Mahon, Mahon Logging, discussed the extreme terrain of Idaho’s mountains, which requires specific equipment and skillset, on the April Let the Sawdust Fly radio show with host Peter Wood.
Mark stated, “I'm one of those kids that have been basically raised in a logging truck and going to the woods…I'm a fourth-generation logger from Council, Idaho, with a booming population of 850 people. We definitely don't have to worry about traffic lights. Our high school mascot is the lumberjack. We were a former mill town. In 1994, as federal timber supply dwindled, the mill was removed.”
Idaho’s steep mountain terrain created a problem for loggers to harvest on grades over 100% or a 45° angle, and buncher levelers can only go so far. A unique form of mechanized logging was born. Tethered, cable assist logging makes harvesting on steep slopes possible by attaching a 1 1/8-inch cable to a 60,000-pound buncher, with the anchor being a 90,000-pound excavator. With the cable, Mark can harvest on angles greater than 45 degrees. A winch, where the cable runs through on the excavator, is connected via radio, and the operator in the buncher controls the winch as he goes up and down the mountainside. The cable effectively pulls the machine into the hill, and with the help of the buncher itself tracking up and down with a leveler, mechanized logging is made possible on such steep slopes.
Tethered logging has proved to be a paramount success in safety and efficiency. Mark explained, “Loggers are some of the most inventive-minded, determined people on the planet. Whenever there is a problem, a logger will build something and figure it out. The problems are getting sawyers or timber fallers off the ground and out of dangerous situations. Falling trees is one of the most dangerous jobs in the world.”
Mark also harvests using cable systems to carry logs up the hill. Cable systems are used when tethered logging cannot be done. This type of logging has its challenges, including setting up the cable systems.
Mark described, “The way we had done it most of my career is you just grab the haywire, it's a smaller line about 3/8 inch diameter cable, and start walking down the hill dragging it behind you, go all the way to the end (ranging from 1,000 to 4,000 feet), and then we'll run it through a pulley, or a block, as loggers call them, and then you make that trip twice, making a complete circuit. It’s very labor-intensive, time-consuming, and difficult.
Now, we use a four-motor drone that pulls a 1/4-inch synthetic rope, flies down to the anchor point, releases it, flies back to the road, grabs the other end, and flies it down. The rope pulls out our haywire (3/8-inch diameter cable), which pulls our skyline (1 1/8-inch cable).
What typically would have taken me four or five hours, the drone can fly in 10 minutes. We have to be careful; we can't fly it in real windy conditions. They tell us they do fall from the sky. Gravity still works.”
This drone can lift and fly 45 pounds, and they use it to fly a 5-gallon bucket of oil to a machine on the mountainside.
Another challenge in setting up a cable system is creating an intermediate support in the middle of the hill if there is a hump on the hillside. “It’s similar to a chairlift on the ski hill, how chairs will pass over the poles going up the mountain on the ski hill.”
Mark’s intermediate support on the hillside is a tree; “I will pick out the biggest, straightest, strongest tree in the location that I need it. I’ll get my belt, spurs, climbing rope, axe, hatchet, power saw, whatever I need. Climb the tree. Usually I'll go 50 feet or so, and if I don't feel the tree is the strongest or it's leaning wrong, then sometimes I'll cut the tree off at 50 feet. I'm trying to make it stronger. As you're pulling on that tree, the logging forces want to pull that tree over. If I cut the top off, that reduces some of the leverage working on the root system and makes it stronger. So yeah, you're up there 50 feet and have a power saw in your hands cutting the tree.
Statistics say that 90% of sawyers get hurt within 10 feet of the stump. When you're 50 feet in the air, you really cannot get away from the stump; you're pretty well stuck to it. You want to be sure that you do your job right. You just take your time, wedge it over, and fall it the same way.
For safety, I have a chain and binder, and right below my cut, I will take that chain and binder and snap the chain tight. The biggest thing you're afraid of is if the tree splits in half while you're still up there. It will crush you. When that top is going over, that force ends up pushing you - that is a huge adrenaline rush! A smaller tree will really get to whipping you, and you'll move two or three feet from center. Yeah, you don't have to buy a ticket for that ride, that's for sure.”
