Window Washers: Climbing Confidently Into The Unknown

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​Every single day thousands of men and women plunge—or more accurately, climb—into the unknown. Window washing is far from a glamorous profession. Intensely physical, and not suited for the faint of heart. Window washers use scaffolds and swing sets to scale immense buildings on a near daily basis. While recognition for their courage goes widely overlooked, we depend on window washers to keep our skylines looking their very best.

With that said, it seems important to take pause and recognize the incredible courage it takes to keep the facades of our cities looking the way that they do. After all, accidents do happen.

Just one week ago two window washers suffered the scare of their lives. In the process of cleaning one of New York City’s most prominent and monumental structures, the scaffold from which they were working became destabilized. The term ‘destabilized’ does not even begin to describe what occurred. One side of the scaffold dropped down to a near vertical angle. In consequence, the two men were left hanging in midair for the next two hours. To say that they were terrified does not even begin to articulate the emotional impact of this experience. It was only after these two hours, hanging sixty nine floors above stable ground, that the men were finally able to climb to safety through a hole made in a window.

In light of this terrifying and indeed shocking occurrence, concerns about safety run rampant. The scaffolding company that designed this shoddy scaffold is now under investigation, and window cleaning companies everywhere are reviewing safety standards.
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It goes without saying that safety harnesses are an absolute must. Without being secured to the exterior of the edifice, window washers have absolutely no way of being secure lest a scaffold or boatswain malfunction. In addition, companies far and wide are going to begin bearing down on enforcing the proper safety regulations attached to the equipment they use: from ladders all the way up to scaffolds. Regardless of a building’s stature, window washers can be hurt on the job. Indeed, following the tragic death of a fifteen year old window washer—in Washington DC, back in 1998—the safety regulations of this trade have become a matter of the utmost importance. The building on which this young man was working was only four stories high. This simply demonstrates the attendant dangers of this profession: a profession that we deeply depend on, and which we should thus deeply respect.