Injuries In the Shop, Part One
I have to admit I haven’t watched a minute of Extreme Makeover, but since they were in Iowa last summer there was a lot of excitement around here over the show.
Recently, I was in the shop talking with a few people about Ed Sanders hand injury. Ed is a designer and builder on the show and he talks about the injury on his personal blog. It’s a long entry and his discussion of it doesn’t really begin until halfway down. There is also a link to photos of his hand after it was stitched. (Depending on your tolerance of graphic injuries, you may or may not want to take a look.) The doctors did a good job closing the wound, but it extends across his palm from thumb to pinkie.
According to Ed, a lot of things led to his injury. If you watch the show, you know that there’s lots going on. They build a house (usually a big house) in a week with the help of a lot of construction volunteers. Ed was using a right-angle grinder equipped with a chainsaw accessory blade used for carving. It’s obvious he was rushing to get a job done. There must have been cords or machinery lying around. In the blink of an eye, he tripped and landed with one hand — palm down — on the spinning chainsaw blade.
Sanders didn’t lose the hand, but it was close. Three months after the injury, and thanks to a great team of surgeons, he’s well on his way to regaining full use of the injured hand. I’m sure if he had it to do over again he’d make sure the work area was clear and that he was more careful. Sometimes that’s all it takes to avoid serious injury.