My bucket truck bucket got stuck up in the air for 45 minutes last Thursday

I was delivering a big funeral arrangement to a church in town. Got the bucket up to the second floor window and then nothing. Controls just stopped. I was stuck up there for 45 minutes until my buddy came with a ladder. Turns out a pin sheared off in the control linkage. I carry spare pins now in my tool box. Has anyone else had a bucket truck fail on them mid job?

3 comments

3 Comments

the_max1mo ago

My dad ran a tree service for 30 years and had 3 bucket trucks fail on him total. The scariest one was when the hydraulic line blew and the bucket came down real slow then just stopped halfway. He was up there for almost an hour before the shop guy got there with a replacement line. What gets me is how these things happen at the worst possible times like when youre already stressed about a job or the weathers turning bad. Seems like a common thing with older equipment that looks fine on the outside but the real problems hide in the little parts that nobody checks until they snap.

nina_campbell1mo ago

Man that must've been terrifying for your dad, glad he got down safe eventually.

taylorc401mo ago

No kidding, @nina_campbell, hydraulic failures are no joke. My buddy runs a small tree service and one of his bucket trucks just dropped him about ten feet when a seal blew. He was trimming a oak branch over a fence line and the thing came down hard but the boom held. He was stuck dangling there for maybe 20 minutes before they could get the outriggers reset and lower him manually. The real kicker is the truck was only 8 years old but the lines were the factory originals. Regular maintenance catches the big stuff but those hoses and fittings just rot from the inside out and you never see it coming.