<img src="http://dgrin.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=22800&stc=1&d=1202766366">

What's the story??

Rented 600 goes for a drink.. The monopod head snapped off sending the lens, TC and body crashing to the pavement. The lens mount then snapped taking the lens and TC down to the Florida water below. Divers recovered it...a total loss. Renter was responsible for 1/12 the cost due to adequate insurance and the rental company was lookig for creative ways to dispose of the carcass.

Man...no one wants to see this happen..even to a "girlie lens"!! (doh!! just kidding)

And also why I bought a brand new tripod and ball head to support it.

JUST KIDDING!!!

Let's see who jumps down my throat for that!
:-P

I can totally see the advantage of the gimbal head for that kind of weight. It allows for more one-handed operation and movement, and you don't have to constantly tighten or loosen the ball head in between bird sightings. But, that said, loosening the ball head and getting ready to shoot took all of .5 to 1.0 sec and wasn't that big of a deal. Once the ball head was loose, the lens was plenty balanced enough to move around and track the birds.

Had my dad there for one of the days, also with a 500mm rental. At times we had a couple of hands on the tripod and a couple on the lens while we made adjustments for better footing. For much of the time we were standing on 6" of ice, so we were being careful. But, for shooting, no, two hands only.

...at sleeve wrapped around the tripod =-P

right off of the face of the body.. ouchies. IIRC, Canon decided they could not repair the camera, but the lens was fine..

that sucks.

What monopod was he using?

A couple years back I saw a guy with a newer Sony F900 HD vid camera drop his rig (with the ever so cheap ($27,000) wide agle (4.5mm to 18) lens) right off the bck of his tripod. First it smashed the back end battery plate (not cheap) then it snapped the lens in two at the double extender. Even though the guy was right there he couldn't do squat about it. Next time he'll balance his camera better on the tripod and then lock it off before turning his back to talk to the cute girl! That'll ruin your shoot day.

He had something the size of a 70-200 on a consumer body on a $2 tripod, setup in the water trying to shoot water fowl... one breeze and splash!

United lost my bags when I went to Oz last year. I wandered into a photo store looking for a cheap tripod to use temporarily, thought about the consequences of doing so, and walked out with a $400 tripod instead. (well, it would have cost $200 at B&amp;H, but I didn't have much choice at the time)