Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the hydraulic house The bucket trucks were in their bays, quiet as a mouse. Their buckets and liners were hung by the upper boom with care Anticipating that a downed wire or damaged tree soon would be there. The tools and ropes were nestled all snug on the truck beds While visions of sugar-plums danced on the control heads And mamma with her saw scabbard and I with my tools Had just settled down to work on the triple valve spools. When out on the lawn there arose such a clatter It was clear that this would take much more than just a … [Read more...]

We’re hearing a lot recently about the raging wildfires in California and the Santa Ana winds that fan the fires.  You might ask what this has to do with bucket trucks … well, once the wildfires are extinguished, California is going to have to rebuild communities – that includes the utility poles and power lines.  We’re kinda partial to utility equipment vehicles here, so we can think of lots of other ways bucket trucks and digger derricks will be used in the restoration process. But, getting back to Santa Ana winds, what the heck are they?  Are they named after Santa Anna, the leader of … [Read more...]

Weather is something we cannot ignore in the bucket truck business. Tree trimmers get busy when high winds knock down trees, and utility companies respond when weather-caused emergencies occur. And now another hurricane season (June – November) is upon us. It doesn’t seem like that long ago that we were talking about 2017 and the monster hurricanes that hit Puerto Rico, Florida, and Texas – not to mention the devastation of some other Caribbean islands. With that in mind, here is what NOAA predicts for 2018. Boy, wouldn’t you like to have a job that allowed such room for error?!  In … [Read more...]