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Grae79

What's the worst you've ever injured yourself at work? and what's the worst you've seen first-hand?

Personally have never had much; no bad shocks (touch wood), odd stanley injury when was a boy; but soon learn from that!, and - again when much younger - stuck a wood chisel in my arm. Was more of a glancing blow really; nice scar tho.

Worst that i've seen was a guy take his finger off with a bandsaw. Was for cutting steel/aluminium so wasn't that sharp. Think it was half cut/half tear. Just what u wanna see when you're at work! He got a nice payout anyway.
 
Injury to myself was the time I had a bow saw jump when cutting a lump of wood & it skinned the index finger of the hand that was holding the wood. Nasty at the time but only have a half inch scar now.

Nastyest I've seen actually happen......many years ago while on an exercise in the former West Germany the vehicle infront of us in the convoy, a stalwart (hmlc) 6 wheeled ammunition carrier rolled over, throwing the vehicle commander out of the capola that he was stood up in. He ended up with smashed/crushed knees & lower legs when the cab rolled over his legs......BARF....
 
Nice!
I haven't had any really bad injuries touch wood. A yesar ago I stood up from screwing back a low level Skt and the kitchen fitter had put a cupboard above my head whilst I was working at low level. I stood up and BANG - nice inch cut opened up on my head. The funniest part was I immediately started rubbing it cos it was sore and the chippy watching me fainted because he had seen the cut opoen up with blood going all down my face and shirt lol
 
that ammo carrier story is naaaaaaaasty! worst/best electrical one have heard of was from a guy i worked with once, was workin on 3 ph DB....can't remember what he'd done....obviously something idiotic...was blown across the room by it...was hospitalised but survived...lucky bar steward!!
 
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Been a sky engineer on and off for some time, never witnessed but i heard of grim story where an engineer drilling through a wall skewered a sleeping dog on the other side! eww
 
just after I started with my current firm, last year we started an industrial job. We requested a cherry picker, but told that it wont arrive for a couple of days and so crack on regardless, long story short, fell of the top step of a step ladder ( I now know why they tell you not to stand on the top step lol) shattered a bone in my hand and six weeks off. still dont know how it happened as I landed on my feet?? the foreign doctor at poole hospital asked me which finger it was that was hurting, bearing in mind one was blue and pointing 90 degrees to the rest of them. When I told my college lecturer I wouldnt be able to do my final practical exam he told me of a lad that the year before fell of the bottom step of a step ladder and broke both his legs!!! I dont really know what to make of that, is it funny, impressive, disturbing??? I really dont know!!!
 
Cut the old head open a few times whilst tiling under kitchen cupboards doing the splash backs, funny how you always seem to forget about them until you crack your head for the 3rd time, I should really learn to be more carefull but all the knocks to the head have made me forgetfull.
 
sliced my hand open when i was younger while scraping a gasket off a sump

fell off ladders then a ratchet hit me smack on the forehead caused a bit of blood


that was in my mechanic days not done anything while been a sparky (yet touch wood)
 
Ripped the top of my finger off in my younger mechanic days. Timing mark on the flywheel was dirty and I conld not see it properly, so I went to wipe it clean.................Using a strobe to illuminate!!!!!!!!!!!! DOH
 
been lucky myself but worked on a building site during my apprenticeship, didn't actually see it myself but a guy lost the top of his head whist using a disc cutter when the disc shattered
 
The best one I saw was a guy cleaning his gun in Iraq back in 1991. It was the SMG (Sub machine gun, weapon choice of Storm Troopers!!). Anyhow this thing has a fixed firing pin, said person dropped the working parts back in with a mag fitted, picked up a round, chambered and fired. Bullet went through his thigh and with Einstine's laws of physics (equal and opposite reactions and all that) the working parts (500g of metal atleast) popped back out of the weapon and smacked him between the eyes. Once he came round and mentioned the F word a few thousand times, realised his thigh was a little worse for wear, promptly fainted!!!! Fortunately 30 or so stitches and was up and walking in a couple of weeks. Only just missed the massive artery on his inner thigh.
 
about 20yrs ago my mate who was an apprentice at the same company was in a loft space metal joists school i think it was anyhow . he was told to connect submain up as there was a board up there the spark who was incharge had already connected feed end and pulled fuse , so it was supposidly safe for him to work on it there was an almighty screem then my mate fell through the ceiling onto the boards below he was dead . the plumber came to look what was happening saw him dead gave him cpr brought him back .
weeks in hospital result .scar around his neck where he had gold chain with cross that melted totally into his skin as it got hot ,massive star shaped scar on his back as this is where arc exited his body
and lots of scars all over his upper body where he touched the metal joists as it was only boarded where you needed to stand
findings were that the spark had connected incoming live and neutral wrong used 2xred tails and marked 1 with black tape got em wrong so neutral was live
 
about 20yrs ago my mate who was an apprentice at the same company was in a loft space metal joists school i think it was anyhow . he was told to connect submain up as there was a board up there the spark who was incharge had already connected feed end and pulled fuse , so it was supposidly safe for him to work on it there was an almighty screem then my mate fell through the ceiling onto the boards below he was dead . the plumber came to look what was happening saw him dead gave him cpr brought him back .
weeks in hospital result .scar around his neck where he had gold chain with cross that melted totally into his skin as it got hot ,massive star shaped scar on his back as this is where arc exited his body
and lots of scars all over his upper body where he touched the metal joists as it was only boarded where you needed to stand
findings were that the spark had connected incoming live and neutral wrong used 2xred tails and marked 1 with black tape got em wrong so neutral was live
If the fuse was pulled out wouldn't that of made it safe regardless of live terminals being reversed ?
 
Not if it was a normal MEM type switchfuse as they just break the live through the switc and fuse and the neutral is justy connected in a block. So if swapped, even with the switch off the neutral would be broken but the live would not be.

Nick
 
ohh i understand. There's no space for human error in any circumstance then.
 
A few years back i employed a 50 (or so) year old x contracts manager who had been paid off due to a stroke and his then employer did not want to kill him with the stress of the job. He came to work for me on 'the tools' and with in a few months he drilled into a buried (in a wall, above ground) incoming supply to a house, his battery drill melted and the flash burns between his fingers required skin grafts etc Luckerly his heart took the jolt but he had second thoughts about being on the tools and soon left.( The HSE were a nightmare to deal with and although the electricity supply company admitted the cable should not have been buried in the wall they tried to bill him for the repair! )
Also on site a builder wanted a tiny bit of skirting and whilst chatting away he held the skirting by the short bit whilst using a circular saw to cut it, his finger hanging off was enough to make me go faint.
(He just got in his van and drove to the hospital over 15 miles away, it was 6 months before he could use that hand again. (It took me longer then that to stop remembering and feeling sick using my circular saw)

I am M.O.D first aid trained and a big pansy when it comes to someone elses blood (pratice dumbies dont bleed and thank god im not a registered/delegated first aider,fainting cant help the injured!!!)
 
Like most people for me cuts and bruses,
However when I was an apprentice
We were subbing for the main electrical contractor (some warehouses on the Thames) Installing the fire alarm system which was MICC

One morning the site was in darkness
The existing supply to the building was being used for site Tempories and the new head was being used for the perminant installation.
Over night the old head caught fire, so after the fire Birgade put the fire out both our sparks and the main contractors sparks relocated the supplies onto ther new head.

Everyone was happy as power was restored and the site was working again.

That afternoon I was dressing pyros in the basement when the LEB (London Electricity Board) jointers arrived.

A few minute later there was an explosion and and the jointer put a hacksaw throught the old incomer.

The guy went to hospital for 3 months.......


After the accident was investigated it turns out that the engineer was working off a photo-copy of a drawing and turned the building next door off.

The jointer tested the end of the cable and it showed dead, and according to the LEB rules he was allowed to cut the cable.

But unknown to all there was a fault on the blue phase, and rather than stripping the paper and lead off layer by layer and cutting each core indivually which was the safer but slower way to carryout the work.

Ther reason he wanted to finish quickly, was it was his birthday and he wanted to get down the pub

Richard
 
In my 1st year at college, I was up on top of the cubicles and I fell down through the joists, one leg either side.. I fell hard, it was like coming off your bike when you're a kid.

When I'd finally climbed down the ladder I put my hand down my jeans to hold my balls (like you do) and felt a sting. I pulled my hand out and it was soaked in blood.

I'd ripped a hole the size of a 2p piece in my scrotum, had to go to A+E for stitches (all my classmates were in stitches). now I've got a nice Y shaped scar, which I've proudly shown my girlfriends over the years!
 
I fell 4ft off a ladder and snapped my leg, leg went through the rung and i landed on the ladder my leg ended up wrapped round the ladder sort of shaped like the letter L below the knee, just goes to prove you dont need to fall far to have a injury......
 

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