Owen Lowe wrote:

snipped

It may be quibbling, but every tool in the shop can kill you and many of
those are much more statistically risky, injury-wise, to operate than a
lathe. I would suppose lathe injuries tend to be much less severe and
permanently disfiguring than injuries from table saws, jointers, band
saws, routers or a number of other shop tools. In the four years I've
been turning I've only seen one instance of moderately severe facial
injuries from a flying piece of wood (a few years back in the AAW
Journal). I've seen, read and heard of nicks to the chins, friction burn
injuries to the hands, bruised and blackened fingernails, a bruised
temple (from getting smacked by a tool handle after the operator tried
peering into a hollow form while the lathe was running and tool still
working inside) and plethora of cuts, nicks and scrapes to the fingers.
Every one of these injuries, including the facial bruising in the
Journal picture, would heal within a week or two. Other shop tools
remove fingers permanently. When was the last time the injury with a
table saw, jointer or band saw you were told about resulted in only
bruising?

I agree it's rare but many years ago, when I was in grade school a
friend of mine was killed by a bowl blank that broke off its mounting,
split in half and impaled him in the forehead.

(Charles Singbush, P.S. 33, Buffalo, NY, approx. 1964)

--
Jack Novak
Buffalo, NY - USA

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