This time of year, giant decorations of spiders and silky webs decorate doors and windows everywhere you look. Along with cats, bats, and witches, spiders are one of Halloween’s most recognized icons. And even if these creepy-crawly decorations send a shiver up your spine, a spider’s ability to cast silk of great strength is an impressive skill to consider when designing and using fall protection systems. Did you know that inch for inch a spider’s web is as strong as steel cable? And spiders are able to produce their silk -- seemingly by magic -- even in mid-air while they're falling!

Long before science was able to measure the great strength of a spider’s silk, cultures around the world have long revered spiders for their ability to weave strong and intricate webs. In folklore, spiders were regarded as mystical creatures and oracles of fate, wealth, weather, and even life and death. But what connects spiders most strongly to Halloween is their reputation of being companions to witches. From this connection, two superstitions arose over time about spiders on Halloween.

Superstition #1 holds that if you see a spider fall into a candle-lit lamp on Halloween, that’s an omen that witches are nearby. So lock the doors and close the windows!

Superstition #2 is a bit more comforting. This one holds that if you see a spider on Halloween, it’s a sign that the spirit of one of your ancestors is watching over you on this enchanted night.

Whether you believe in superstitions or not, it’s hard not to be impressed by a creature who can literally manufacture its own safety net on demand. Fortunately for the rest of us, GSS has the expert architects and engineers to design systems that are so strong and compliant, we can all feel safe when working on a job—as if protected by magic.

Happy Halloween from all of us at GSS!