Common mistakes

These are not ignorance. They are shortcuts that have worked many times before.

On the gear

• Using a sling with no legible marking because “it is the same as the other one”
• Reading the WLL for a straight hitch and then choking it
• Knotting the sling to shorten it
• Joining two slings with a shackle to reach further
• Seating the sling on the hook tip instead of the saddle
• Twisting the sling so it bears on the edge of the webbing

On the load

• Attaching to a lashing point, handle or guardrail
• Assuming the weight because the load resembles something familiar
• Forgetting water, snow, ice or soil that comes along
• Forgetting that packaging and frame weigh too
• Slinging over loose parts instead of securing them first

In the geometry

• Using short slings because they were nearest, and getting a flat angle
• Believing four legs share equally on a rigid load
• Rigging symmetrically on a load that is not symmetrical
• Skipping edge protection because the edge “is not that sharp”

In the organisation

• Nobody has said out loud who signals
• Skipping the trial lift because it is urgent
• Carrying on after something changed — new load, new place, new person
• Not speaking up because the crane is already standing waiting

What they share

Every one of them saves seconds, and every one of them has gone fine before.
That is precisely why they are hard to stop doing. See the article
The danger of a good run and the
lifting plan section.