They didn't know/ didn't tell us

When I started to do boiler work in power generation, the old scaffolds had only railings on one side and were hand cranked. Since the inside of one of the boilers starts at the 34' elevation and continues to the 166' elevation you get the picture how big it is.
We had only a single safety belt that was pretty much useless if you fell. Later on working at heights we had a full harness as pictured and I hung from one once, its painful.
We had no PPE to speak of back then, no respirators and no hearing protection. Asbestos was removed by knocking it off pipes using a hammer with no protection whats so ever and thats just for openers
So many guys in my age bracket I worked with are dead of cancer and lung related conditions, at times I think im on borrowed time
We've come a long way in this country when it comes to worker safety and thats a good thing