This will make any guitarist uncomfortable...

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/ouch--builder-ala...et-drayton.html

The guy I work with fired a 3.5" nail and it rebounded out and into his thumb. It went down behind his nail, curled around the joint and came out the side of the thumb. How he never shattereed his thum joint was a mystery to all!!!


This post has been edited by Sensible Jones: Mar 21 2012, 08:24 PM

That must have been a totally non triumphant situation !

that looks nasty..... but would probably have been quite funny to see happen

I should be safe enough though because I cant build anything!

Oh man that is knarly! Being in the construction trade for most of my adult life I have seen this before not only with other people but myself as well. As for myself the time I shot myself with a nailgun, I was nailing down a top plate onto a midspan pony wall in a crawl space area, I got too close to the edge of the top plate (2x6) and the nail skipped off the side and and shot down below into my left hand which was holding the stud on layout, the nail went into my hand between my thumb and forefinger right next to my thumb, fortunately it didnt hit any bone and just shot into the fleshy part of the hand and it was funny how squeamish my workmates were ,at first no-one wanted to pull it out but I finally convinced on of my buddies to yank on it and it came right out, I went and got a tetanus shot just to be safe and everything was ok.

Before that when I was still pretty green at construction I was setting some nails in the block that goes betwwen each roof truss on top of a wall. I was setting the nails in the blocks and handing them up to the guys who were installing them. I was in a rush trying to stay ahead of them and in doing that I drove a 16 penny sinker right thru my ring finger of my left hand on the front side right between the first and second knuckle. Luckily this nail also did not hit bone but was right next to it and my finger was pinched tight where the nail went thru. Looked kinda funky lol. I pulled that one out myself and everything was ok but a bit sore for a while.

None of that scared me as much as watching a guy nailing off a floor and he nailed his foot to the deck, thru his foot , thru the floor decking and into a floor joist, the nails used to nail down the floor decking are called ring shanks and instead of being smooth they have rings around the shaft which make them very hard to pull, on top of that the decking is also glued to the floor joists with construction adhesive and like the guy in the story Ben posted we had to cut out part of the floor and the floor joist the nail was in. lucky for this guy he didnt hit any bone either and the nail went right between his big toe and his second toe but the guy was in a lot of pain while we were cutting the floor out and threw up all over the place while we were doing this. He was back at work at the beggining of the next week laughing about it though . The last thing I did to my hand wassnt construction related , I was washing our boat, and ran my wet hand right into one of the cleats on the boat used to tie it to a dock . The cleat went right into the fleshy part of my hand between the thumb and forefinger right in the same area I had shot a nail into years before. It made a popping sound as it went in and basically just left a hole and you could see into my hand right there in that webbed like area. although it didnt bleed at all it was pretty gross to the guys that were helping me that day.

As bad as all that sounds I never got any permanent damage from any of those wounds and they actually healed pretty fast.
These things sound like dumb mistakes but let me tell you these things happen even to the best and most carefull of us. You just have to be extra carefull and try not to get into too much of a hurry because these things happen the most when people are in a rush.

Oh yeah! I had one other incident while nailing up my bands banner outside of the place we were playing at , I hit my index finger with the hammer and basically splatted it, and that night at the gig it kept bleeding, There was blood on my guitar , the stage, and my clothes, I must have looked pretty hardcore up there that night

Be carefull out there guys because as we all know.. Stuff happens!

Dear God that's hardcore. Gave me a bit of a shiver. Just imagine? On your fretting arm? THUMP and you've got a board and nail to add to your neck solo. Ouch.

was his/your finger on the trigger
having been shot several times ( once from myself , many times from newbies), that is the first question I ask
in my experience people leaving their finger on the trigger causes the majority of these kind of accidents and from his story sounds like he did as well,like with real guns you never put your finger on the trigger unless you are ready to shot
not to sound mean , to me , this was not a accident,it was carelessness


my in law shot between the two bones in his forearm locking his wrist from twisting( and yes- he had his fingeron the trigger when he was not ready to shoot

Freaky stories here!!

Guitarist's nightmare for sure!

I love the comment from the web article:
LIMERICK:
When Suzanne came through the front door,
Her partner was nailed to the floor.
Then seeing no supper
Or hot, steaming cuppa,
She shot two more bolts through his paw.

Rich, the more I learn about you, the more you amaze me. Good advice & stay safe, my friend.

Good point Jstcrsn! The guy in the story Ben posted had to have had his finger holding the trigger down. There is no other way I know of that this could happen. As was my buddy that nailed his foot to the floor.Most of the guys I have worked with do this when nailing off the floor decking. They just keep the trigger pinned and bounce the gun along . Its much faster but it is a bad habit. I do it myself but I cant think of any other time other than nailing off a floor that I have done this. Some guys will even go as far as disengaging the trigger safety which is even more dangerous, With the trigger safety you have to press the gun down against what ever you are nailing and pull the trigger for it to fire. It wont fire just by pulling the trigger, but if you disengage that safety mechanism you are just asking for it. It's very easy to hurt or even kill yourself or others taking these kinds of risks. I dont like working with guys that do this and if they work for me I wont allow it. I would have to agree that the guy in the story Ben posted was being careless.
As for myself when I nailed my hand it was because I was nailing too close to the edge of the board and the nail skipped out and traveled a couple feet before it entered my hand.


Heh! Thanks alot Blister, will do buddy!

This post has been edited by AK Rich: Mar 22 2012, 01:54 AM

That's why I never DIY too much poor guy...