Major table saw injury of a friend

[dirk martin]

I just found out a friend just suffered a board kickback on his table saw.
He took it in the face pretty seriously.
He's got 13 fractures.
Hard to believe the power in these saws.

Be careful, gang.

[sullivan mcgriff]

Ouch, hope all works out well my only kickback was a chunk of 1/8 ply to the abdomen but It hurt like heck

[Mike Heidrick]

Prayers sent for him.

I got hit in the gut due to kickback as well in 2004. I got cut THROUGH my shirt. It literally pushed the shirt into my gut with the board. I had done so many things wrong on that cut, the least of which was not having a splitter in place. It was on the shelf. Standing behind the blade was another no no, no safety glasses on. I was really lucky on many accounts. It launched that 12"X12"X3/4" plywood square like it was a missile. Many life lessons taught that day.

Really hoping your friend heals soon.

[Scott Brandstetter]

Best wishes to your friend and thanks for the reminder.

[Brian Williamson]

A few years ago I was cutting grooves into the face of a squat aluminum cylinder on the TS. I had the Al clamped in a jig affixed to a sliding table. I was wearing a face shield and going slow, taking shallow cuts. Unfortunately the saw I had at the time had no splitter. All was well and good until on one pass I unclamped the work from the jig before the piece was fully clear of the back of the blade. The chunk of Al was thrown back at me and hit me on the back of the hand. Of course it cut to the bone as there is not much meat on the hand to disperse the energy. Fortunately I did not sever anything important. It took about a dozen stitches to close and I was on my way.

I feel for your friend and wish him as speedy a recovery as possible from such a significant injury.

[Brian W Smith]

Best wishes for your bud!

The worst,and only cut I ever got from using a saw in 40+ years of WW'n was with a dang handsaw.Razor sharp just doesn't do justice to how we run our handsaws.......Was in a major hurry(hint,hint),doing a "reverse" handed cut.I can hear the 'ole guys even now,"do the rip first,then cross-cut to finish"....but,being in a hurry,I did it exactly the other way.Crosscut went as planned,but because the "rip"...split out,and my support hand was in the line of fire.....ziiiiipppp.About a 1/2 dz stitches in the left hand,right in the web between thumb and first finger.

And it was a real jagged cut......think,long strokes with a razor sharp 10 pt.The irony,I was doing a Drs office cabinet job(30 years ago)......and the guy was an orthopedic,"hand" specialist.You talk about embarrassed....sheeesh.

[Mike Cozad]

Best wishes to your friend. Horrible way to bounce in to springtime. I hope he recovers well and quickly!

For those of you that have suffered an injury, do you find aprehension when you get back to the shop? I often have breaks from the shop for months at a time due to my day job and find that I am timid around my tools at first. It takes me a few hours if not days to get comfortable and stop secod guessing every cut and setup. I can only imagine how I would be after an injury... it really started for me after my wife was getting back to quilting after a almost a year away and ran a huge quilting needle through her index finger and nail while trying to get her mojo back....

[Kevin Womer]

My thoughts go with your friend, I hope he has a speedy recovery.

[Robert Clarcke]

It's just sad. Best wishes for him.

http://dailydigitaldeals.info/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/11/10/buy.gif

[glenn bradley]

Best wishes for your friends recovery. I'm not trying to be smart when I ask if the usual list of safety features were missing from the procedure? It is always good to re-re-re-confirm the value of sliding tables, sleds, splitters, riving knives, blade guards, proper use of miter gauge and fence, etc. to remind us all that a moments shirking of tablesaw safety can make you a statistic. Kickback happens so fast I just have to roll my eyes when folks say they can stop the material with their hands or they will dodge out of the way. Let's all take extra care and be able to woodwork a good long time.

[Gary R Katz]

Whenever someone posts a tablesaw injury I force myself to read it, then I read all the comments, which are usually about TS injuries. It makes me aware of the potential for serious injury if I'm not constantly and consciously careful (my 3 C's), especially since I've got an old Rockwell without any safety features.
I hope your friend heals well and quickly.

[John TenEyck]

Glenn, I'll wager your comment rings true in many if not all kickback related injuries. I force myself to use every safety device on my TS whenever possible. I've redesigned some to make them easier to use - so that I will. This incident is yet another example of how TS's can do more than just cut off our fingers. Even a SawStop.

To the OP, I hope your friend heals well and soon.

John

[Rod Sheridan]

Best wishes for your friends recovery. I'm not trying to be smart when I ask if the usual list of safety features were missing from the procedure? It is always good to re-re-re-confirm the value of sliding tables, sleds, splitters, riving knives, blade guards, proper use of miter gauge and fence, etc. to remind us all that a moments shirking of tablesaw safety can make you a statistic. Kickback happens so fast I just have to roll my eyes when folks say they can stop the material with their hands or they will dodge out of the way. Let's all take extra care and be able to woodwork a good long time.

Exactly, a saw without a guard, splitter/riving knife and appropriate push sticks/pads simply shouldn't be used.............Regards, Rod.

[Rick Alexander]

Thirteen fractures - whew - sounds like he's lucky to be alive. Hope he recovers fast and doesn't give up on woodworking afterwards.

Must be the year for kickbacks. I had my first one since I was 16 years old earlier this year (40 years ago - if you're counting). I was setting the position on a tenon jig and didn't tighten the test piece in the jig tight enough and it grabbed it and tossed it onto my belly. It made a perfect imprint of the end of the piece on my belly for the next few weeks - you could actually measure the marks if you wanted to. Thankfully I had a sweatshirt and a thick shirt on or it probably would have went into my gut and really bad things would have happened. Two big mistakes I made were too short piece of wood for the tenon cutter in the first place allowed for the piece to pass undernieth the clamp and I was standing right in the line of fire so I could see if the blade was hitting the reference line correctly which I normally never ever do. I had quite a few contemplative minutes there just after it happened to reflect on just how stupid that little exercise really was. Nope there wasn't a guard - a splitter - riving knife - push stick - or sliding table involved but that had absolutely nothing to do with how it happened. Just a dumb - get it done - moment of lapse in judgement with no lack of safety features fault - just mine. Safety equipment won't save you from yourself every time so be careful out there.

[Steve Collins]

Exactly, a saw without a guard, splitter/riving knife and appropriate push sticks/pads simply shouldn't be used.............Regards, Rod.

I have my belt sander set up to be stationary. When the wood being sanded gets loose on this, it is very close to the same speed as the table saw kick back is. Now, the advantage with the sander is I'm not standing in the path when the wood is launched, but neither am I with the table saw.

[Raymond Fries]

Hope your friend heals soon.

[John Piwaron]

Had a kickback on my saw last summer. But I was following the rules. Standing to the side. Well to the side. Things went to hell quickly. Very quickly. It was all over within 2 seconds or less. The people that say they'll react and get out of the way or deflect the projectile - balogna. Won't happen. Can't happen. Safety equipment and procedures exist for a reason. Not every cut allows the use of all the safety features. Some, like dados, none at all. This is one reason, though not the primary one, that I like the router for dadoing. Routers, of course, have their own safety issues and rules.