Save from a blown hose on the Mississippi

I was working a cutter suction dredge near Baton Rouge last month when a discharge hose let go at the coupling. Mud started spraying everywhere and I had about 30 seconds to kill the pump before we lost prime. Got it shut down fast but we still had to clean a mess of sand and slurry off the deck for two hours. Anyone ever rigged a quick release on their emergency stop that doesn't take forever to reset?

2 comments

2 Comments

young.spencer24d ago

Funny enough I rigged a lanyard to a boat hook on the towboat I used to work on. Took a 3/8 bungee cord, tied it off to the e-stop pull ring, then ran it through a couple of fairleads to the ladder. You just grab the boat hook, snag the bungee, and yank. Reset is just clipping it back onto the hook instead of crawling through slurry. Whole thing cost maybe 15 bucks at West Marine. Not perfect but beats cleaning mud out of your boots for the third time that shift.

sanchez.blake24d ago

That's genius, I did something similar with parachute cord on a dredge in Texas and it saved my back.