FIRST Injury Stories

[George A.]

My senior year I partially amputated my pinky when I was cutting a piece of extruded on a chop saw, and the clamp broke. The piece kicked out and caught me in the hand.

Then later that year on my 18th birthday in Atlanta I was sick in bed after qualification matches for the day...and the picture over my bed in the hotel room fell off the wall and landed on my face....not so fun.

[zakk]

dude, major ouch. no offense but you seemed to have bad karma that day.

[whytheheckme]

One of our mentors got hit by our ramp in the head on Friday at BAE... He needed 8 staples in his head...

Jacob

[Simon Strauss]

Packing up our tools in the bed of NJ this year his hed and mine colided knocking his glasses off as i raised my head to answer a question of his.

I had a little run in with a lose connection in the circuit box in our shop when i tripped a breaker using our mill. Ou shop has two switch boxes, the top of which we do not have the key to, and while reaching my hand up there to flip a breaker back on i grounded my elbow on the metal door and touched a loose connection getting 120V across the forearm.

While filing down aluminum with a bench mounted belt sander this year the rubber finger pad of the tumb on one of my gloves fused to my finger.

Using the same belt sander the year before i took off the corner of one of my knuckles when my hand slipped after a team mate dropped a rack of metal, spurning my usage of gloves.

Got a fat lip using a router when a hot chunk of aluminum got stuck in the face mask i was wearing.

Got a mouth full of spindle oil while using the lathe, Not an injury just funny

All of these and a few fun others that i wont tell you (but im sure my team mates and mentors would be glad to) were sustained while wearing the proper safety equipment, making me the most experienced and motivated safety captian my team has ever had.

I had a burning hot (like blue hot) sliver of aluminum shoot across the shop and bury itself in my cheek. It could have hit my eyes, which made me glad for my safety glasses.

I also was drilling, had the piece of metal grab the bit and shoot out of the clamp, tearing a chunk about 1 cm around out of my left thigh. That one hurt.

[shawger]

Our robot uses Spectra string (300lb min. strength) to control part of our gripper. I was untangling it and the motor started spinning. My thumb got caught.

Luckly people reversed the direction of the motor before my thumb popped off. I still had a lovely scab encircling my thumb for the next week though.

[KarenH]

Originally Posted by Simon Strauss

While filing down aluminum with a bench mounted belt sander this year the rubber finger pad of the tumb on one of my gloves fused to my finger.

Using the same belt sander the year before i took off the corner of one of my knuckles when my hand slipped after a team mate dropped a rack of metal, spurning my usage of gloves.

All of these ... were sustained while wearing the proper safety equipment, making me the most experienced and motivated safety captian my team has ever had.

Ummm... I'm not an expert on shop safety, but warning signs I've seen in shops indicate that gloves are NEVER "proper safety equipment" while operating grinders. Also, gloves should not be worn when operating any power equipment (sanders, mills, lathes, drill presses, etc.) that could potentially grab the glove and pull it in along with your fingers, hand, and maybe even your arm.

[zakk]

yeah this has nothing to do with FIRST but one of my dad's friends got his arm ripped off. O.F.F. off, while using a lathe and it tore up his other arm pretty bad, so now the guy is out of a job cause he was a machinist. sadly my dad had to witness this which is never a good thing to watch.

[FIRST Rocks]

Originally Posted by KarenH

Ummm... I'm not an expert on shop safety, but warning signs I've seen in shops indicate that gloves are NEVER "proper safety equipment" while operating grinders. Also, gloves should not be worn when operating any power equipment (sanders, mills, lathes, drill presses, etc.) that could potentially grab the glove and pull it in along with your fingers, hand, and maybe even your arm.

Quite right. NEVER, EVER, EVER wear gloves when using any kind of power tools. This should be on the list of safety practices right after wearing safety glasses.

[Nica F.]

In 05, i was bringing the tetras back to our school from the gym from our Preship offseason event on a wooden tetra cart that we had.

Someone else was in a hurry and ran past and hit the cart resulting in it flinging towards me and jamming into my ankle ;/

it hurt, and i still have a scar to show. lol

[ZeetherKID77]

Get any splinters?