Season 1
Ax Men is an American docu-reality television series produced by Original Productions that follows the work of several logging crews in the second-growth forests of Northwestern Oregon, highlighting the dangers encountered by the loggers.
Following in the footsteps of other shows from Original Productions like Deadliest Catch and Ice Road Truckers, the series is considered part of a "real-men-in-danger" television programming trend.
The series premiered in the USA on the History Channel on 3 March, 2008. There are 26 hour-long episodes in two seasons to date.
Ax Men premiered in South Africa on DStv's The History Channel on Wednesday 13 August 2008, at 19h35. See "Seasons" below for seasonal broadcast dates and times.
Repeats
Thursdays: 03h35, 11h35
Sundays: 21h25
Mondays: 05h25, 13h25
Synopsis
Ax Men is the first ever non-fiction series about the treacherous life of Pacific Northwest timber cutters.
From History and Original Productions, the same team responsible for Ice Road Truckers, this series looks at the legacy that the pioneers of America laid for the present and future generations of loggers.
Deep in the woods of the Pacific Northwest, rugged men make their living doing one of the most dangerous jobs in history... Logging. Their mission: to retrieve timber perched on mountainsides too steep to access with machines. But this is no easy task.
For more than a hundred years, larger than life characters, many of whom are members of logging families that go back to the time when the West was being settled, have spent their days among towering trees and powerful machines and their nights in outposts far from the comforts of civilization.
Ax Men tells remarkable stories detailing the history of the logging industry, showing how technology has transformed life for today's logger, while the struggle of man versus nature stays the same.
Over the course of 14 episodes, Ax Men follows four logging crews through a season in the remote forests of northwest Oregon.
Plagued by mechanical failures, relentless weather - including a hurricane that ripped through the area - and violent and unpredictable terrain, these brave men risk their lives retrieving the very timber America depends on to build itself.
Snapped cables, runaway logs and treacherous machinery are among the many dangers that threaten their lives and safety everyday.
Anything and everything can go wrong on these sites and the price of even the simplest mistake can mean death.
Seasons
(All seasons air exclusively on The History Channel)
Season 1 (14 episodes)
Premiere: 13 August 2008 | Finale: 12 November 2008 | Wednesdays, 19h35
Season 2 (12 episodes)
Premiere: 5 November 2009 | Finale: 21 January 2010 | Thursdays, 21h15