man-riding
n.— «On Wednesday, the Douglas County sheriff’s office said the two men were secured in a bucket being cabled up 500 to 800 feet when the cable failed, sending the men and the bucket to the ground. The men were in a device that was being hoisted by a wire rope and pulley system rigged to the tower, said sheriff’s Lt. Kari Wempe. Wilcox said the descriptions of the accident he had seen were too sketchy to get a clear sense of how the equipment was rigged. But he said it appeared to resemble a practice called “man-riding.” That system is often used for large or long-term tower projects, he said, because it can take several days just to install the elevator-like device.» —“Deaths of two area men point up danger of working on towers” by Benita Y. Williams Kansas City Star (Kansas-Missouri) July 11, 2007. (source: Double-Tongued Dictionary)
Further reading
Samantha Harvey’s novel Orbital is a sensuous, exhilarating meditation about the strangeness of life on a space station, with its mix of tedious tasks and jaw-dropping views. And: a musician who rode the rails in his youth shares the slang he...
The word filibuster has a long and colorful history, going back to the days when pirates roamed the high seas. Today it refers to hijacking a piece of legislation. Plus, the language of yoga teachers: When doing a guided meditation, you may hear...