Sounds like a few of you need to step away from the power tools and leave them to the pros. :mrgreen:
I've been working with power tools for a long, long time.
Scariest- standing at the top of a 20' extension ladder leaning against a 6" wide metal parking lot light pole. The center of the rung was centered on the square pole. My task, drill a hole to hang a new light fixture. Simple enough. At teh time my best drill was an old Milwaukee 3/8" drill. So I'm leaning pretty heavy to drive the bit through the 3/8" thick steel, bit stops, drill doesn't, my hand was still holding it up until the point my arm was twisted as far as it would go and i finally broke grip, which meant I was in the process of losing my balance 16' off the ground. Ladder sliding left, I'm going right, and drill is stuck in place twisting in circles pull more and more cord around itself. Fortunately, my left hand made contact with the pole and I was able to pull the ladder back center and balance myself, happended aobut the same time the cord came unplugged and the drill stopped.
Another time, helping my brother install an fan in the gable end of his attic. Two story house, Im working basically on the third floor. My extension ladder is on top of the porch roof. Almost done cutting the hole in the wall for the fan when the ladder starts to walk out from under me. I threw the saw in the attic and managed to hook one arm in the opening before the ladder disappears from under me. Long story short, I still have the scar where my arm got scrapped up while I was clinging on for my life.
When I was an electrician in Washington State I was working new apartment complexes. My task for the day was to make the final connections in the electrical panels. I was pushing a 30amp double pole breaker in with my linemans pliers when the pliers slipped off the breaked and shorted both hot legs. Basically, my pliers shorted across 220 volts @ 100amps each. Teh ensuing explosion sent sparks that melted into the glass in my glasses. Fortunately the only damage was to the glasses. Had I not been wearing them I may be blind today.
By far the worst though, I was using a chisle to notch out hinge locations for a cabinet I just finished making. The wife honks the horn to let me know shes home and to help her with groceries. Unfortunately, that split second of distraction was enough time for me to shove the chisle through the side of my thumb, including the nail, and stop at the bone.
Funniest- same set of apartment complexes, this time another guy and myself were doing the electrical trim work. I was installing switches, outlets, and hooking up the hot water tanks. His job was the dinign room light and garbage disposal. Timing wise he would finish a couple minutes before me and head off to the next unit. Once there he was supposed ot turn off the power, however he would stop and smoke a bowl waiting for me. While Im spreading the switches/outlets around the unit he starts on teh garbage disposal. I hear, zap, ****, thumb, zap, ****, bump, MFer. and I start laughing my arse off. Let me interpret. Zap, he just shorted the wire and got shocked by 110v, 15amp,
****- him cusing cuase he got zapped,
thump- hit head head on the cabinet,
zap- pulled head away from cabinet and got zapped agian,
bumb- hit his head again.
Best part- this happened 6 units in a row.
I yell at him, might want to turn the power off next time. His response- yea, yea. Tehn I'd yell at him, hey smoke another bowl, itll be alright. :mrgreen:
