I was friends (past tense because he died of a heart attack) with a guy who operated an excavator (~12,000 pound Kubota KX161-3S) up in the Santa Cruz mountains

I was friends (past tense because he died of a heart attack) with a guy who operated an excavator (~12,000 pound Kubota KX161-3S) up in the Santa Cruz mountains. We've got some pretty steep terrain here. He has walked that excavator into places you simply would not believe it could go. I bought that excavator from him and the company replaced it with a newer model with more "safety" features. According to him if you got on too steep of a slope it shut itself off. Super, super dangerous. Yeah, I get it, he was pushing past the point where he was completely safe. His choice and he could do things with that machine, amazing things. I'm not a fan of the direction heavy equipment is going.