Lockouts save lives
Usually idiots, but sometimes we’re all idiots.
Doesn’t take an idiot to have a millisecond of inattentiveness. A lot of life altering fuckups are simply human error, wife just filed divorce, already not in the game, fuckin Jerry yells something at you from across the shop and next thing you know you’ve put your hand into the table saw.
The above is a real story from when I worked in a prefab home factory. The next day a wall panel was being loaded into a truck, the straps hadn’t been secured properly and one fell and crushed an 18yr old on his second day.
Yeah. No. I get it. I was also just pointing out that we’ve all had our bouts of stupidity. It doesn’t necessarily take idiocy- just as you say, a millisecond of inattentiveness- or a distraction.
when i was in highschool and middleschool, I used to go down to Missouri and spend my summers with my Grandpa and grandma. grandpa was raised in Nixa as a farmboy. There were a lot of practical life lessons. “use the chicken sticks!” he warned me once. “Why? I’ll keep my hand clear.” “You’ve met Tom [his neighbor, who he didn’t really like].” “yeah.” “you see his thumb?” “yes, I mean… no. it’s kinda hard to miss it ain’t… oh. I’ll use the chicken sticks.”
another time, doing some random timber clearing- “wear the safety glasses.” … “You know Tom…” “alight alright.” (tom had a pirate patch.)(I’ll give you two guesses why grandpa and tom never got along.)
Looking back at it, it’s amazing how effective those bits of pragmatic wisdom were. they stuck. if you know what I mean. it’s also kinda amazing how Tom was still alive, given all the anecdotes about his fuck ups.
I think everyone has a Tom in their life at some point, whether they listen to the lessons or not is a different matter.
I had a friend in highschool who’s dad had lost part of his pointer finger to an encounter with a saw blade. He had just a little bit of the bone beyond the second knuckle that was weirdly pointed and it hurt like hell when he jabbed you with it. I know this because I used to help them build shit around their farm and if he caught us being unsafe he’d poke us in the chest with that damn half-finger while he yelled at us about it.
Those lessons really stuck too.
those are lessons best learned second or third hand. I like to say “don’t become an anecdote.”
like one of my employees (contract security.) that set his pants on fire because he was being assaulted by a crack addicted squirrel (yes. you read that right.) and he maced it first which only made it angrier. So he tased it. The thing is… that particular variety of OC spray is… flammable.
the pants-on-fire was in addition to basically macing himself.
needless to say he’s become a fixture in the mace training course. Him and the “Bunny Macer”… that guy was workign an appartment complex. bunnies had learned that people=food, so they always popped out to beg- because people feed them. kids love it. uuhg. They went through a lot of “dont feed the xyz’s”. Deer. Canadian Gangsters (aka canada geese). Well. this bunny was hopping up on his shoe being all “please, sir, may I have some more!” so he maced it.
buns freaked out, ran up his pantleg and got… nibbly. (that guy was a piece of work.)
I like to say “don’t become an anecdote.”
Lol, this makes me think of a guy I went to highschool with. He was a farm kid who would get up early and work around the farm before school. One day he spills gas on his flannel shirt before school but doesn’t have time to change so he figures it’ll air out enough on his way to work (it didn’t). Second or third class of the day was shop. He starts working in the welding booth without stopping to put on the flame retardant overcoat. A hot spark hit that gas soaked flannel and dude light up like the human torch. He had some serious burns but makes a full recovery. For years after that though, the shop teacher used to say to anyone who complained about the overcoats, “go ask Phil if they’re worth it or not”.
I’m glad Phil was okay, in the end. but yep. It do be like that.
![[HSW] well, that was entirely preventable](https://lemmy.world/pictrs/image/e822224d-e684-4f04-87ae-bd938e403508.jpeg){kind=link}