Gates works his way to the top

by Paul V. Arnold

The nervousness begins when you climb into the tiny basket. It’s 5 feet wide and 10 feet long, but it feels smaller than that.

Your palms sweat and your stomach tightens as the basket begins its journey along the rail. You tell yourself, "Don’t look down. Don’t look down." But it’s human nature. You look down. Bad move. You’re more than 50 feet above the plant floor. You have fall protection gear on, but feel very vulnerable.

Your muscles lock. You’ve become a statue. But your mind races. "What if the basket falls? What if I fell? What if I fell on that big machine? Would I die, or be maimed? What if I’m like Bruce Willis in Unbreakable? That’s just a movie. This is nuts! Get me the hell off this thing!"

One man’s terror tram is another man’s thrill ride.

"The job isn’t for everyone. Most of the mechanics won’t work up there. They’re afraid of heights or whatever," says Mike Gates, who maintains and repairs the monorail, crane assemblies and overhead doors at Lockheed Martin Aeronautics’ jet fighter plant in Fort Worth, Texas.

"There is a danger factor. But for me, that’s the fun part."

When working in the rafters, even routine tasks can be risky.

"The reactive work gets my blood pumping, but 75 percent of the work is preventive maintenance," he says.

Gates takes the basket to inspect the monorail and five- to 10-ton bridge cranes. He does calendar-based changeouts. He load-tests the cranes to make sure they hold their stated weight. He checks the cables and makes any needed fixes.

Caring for the doors is an even more time-consuming task. The 7 million square foot plant has approximately 200 rollup, sliding and hangar doors. Some can be 30 feet wide and 60 feet tall.

"You use a cherry picker or zoom boom for the big ones," 
he says. "You have to get on top to really see what’s wrong 
with them."

Surprisingly, most of Gates’ priority calls are for doors.

"They usually break during the hottest and coldest months of the year," he says. "A door gets stuck, a chain breaks or a motor goes out."

If a 30-foot door to the outside doesn’t shut on a humid, 90-degree Texas day, the cost to air condition the plant soars. The same holds true for heating costs on a 20-degree day 
in January.

Other times, weather and energy costs aren’t the concern.

"Recently, there was a problem on a hangar door," he 
says. "They were bringing a plane inside the hangar and the chain popped.

The bigwigs wanted this particular plane inside.

"Well, this huge, No. 80 chain got caught under the wheels that keep the door on a track system. We jacked up part of the door to get the chain from underneath it, restrung the chain and put it back together. We fixed it in 2 1/2 hours. As soon as the door opened, they got the plane in."

Handling tasks of all sizes makes Gates someone to look up to.

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