Thank you for posting this. Your friend obviously knows the mistakes he made and I'm sure many of us have taken a shortcut while climbing into a stand. It does seem that in the recent years there has been a very big movement on the safety side of things. It seems like many more people are wearing safety harnesses and that is great! However, when I think about things, I think the most dangerous position I put myself in is the process of climbing the climbing stick and then moving from the stick into the stand itself. I currently don't attach my safety harness until I'm in the stand and I know I've got an exposure due to that.

What types of tether ropes/products do you guys use to be attached as soon as you take that first step off the ground? I did some research a couple of weeks ago and thought that the product that this site offers (http://safetreehunt.com/sths1.html) might be one of the most economical - if you don't want to make your own tether lines out of good rope. I would probably need 3 of them and yes, $100 is a good chunk of change but I've read enough stories now to know that I've probably been pretty lucky and should implement a further level of safety before that luck runs out.

For those of you who are attached as soon as you step off the ground - what products do you use?