FORMER MIMES
I guess I’m not the only one who gets hurt at work. Workplace injuries happen a lot and are more common than I thought. There’s a theme, too – they often happen because someone, either the worker or the employer, acted like me.
AMY’S STORY
In high school I was working at a fast-food restaurant. During my first week on the job I burned my arm on a hot French fry basket, which left a scar that remained for a couple of years. At the time I didn’t know that I should file a complaint or a report or get first aid…I just ran some cold water on the burn and continued with my work. I didn’t realize there was a procedure to follow for such incidents; I thought that was for people who wrecked their backs or fell and broke a bone on the job, not a relatively minor grease burn. I know that in my case I was new to the job, rushing around and not paying attention to what I was doing.
What happened here? Sure, Amy didn’t speak up. But neither did her boss when she started about the procedures.
KEVIN’S STORY
When I worked at a gas station/car wash for a summer job, I ended up burning the skin on my ankle as I was changing the soap barrels in the back room of the carwash. It kept me off the job for 2 weeks.
Where was the silence here? Were the materials properly labeled? Did Kevin’s gas-station-supremo fill him in on the safety risks in the backroom and ensure he was wearing proper footwear? Should Kevin have said,” I’ve never done that, is there anything I need to know about?” We’ll never know.
SARA’S STORY
My first summer working in a large industrial plant, my friend was seriously injured. She was working on a machine trying to repair something when her glove caught in a roller on the machine and pulled her hand and arm in up to her shoulder. Luckily her arm did not need to be amputated but she now has multiple pins in her arm which has never worked quite the same way.
Ah, gloves caught in a machine. A personal favourite. How many co-workers watched Sara’s friend wear them and thought to themselves, “if those get caught, her arm’s history?” Were the risks made clear by her manager? For that matter, did the manager’s manager stand up for the budget line item to have the machines properly guarded? Who knows. But the silence is deafening.
DANIELLE’S STORY:
I work at a gas station and often I have to go make bags of ice to sell. So one day I went down back because we were running out of ice. I opened the door to the ice maker. And someone had set a broom handle on top of it so when I opened the door it shook the ice maker and the handle fell on my head, it was a good thing I didn’t look up or otherwise I could have gotten it in my eye.
A broom to the eye. There’s one you’re not expecting. How many people noticed it there and never said anything, I wonder?
BYRON’S STORY
I worked with a painting company for the summer. We got paid by job, not by hours. To save time we would try and limit the number of ladder movements, by “hopping” ladders. We were painting a house that was built over a river with the water flowing under the house. We found an old door, lodged it between two rocks on the river bed and put the ladder on it and began painting. The guy beside me fell 40 feet into the shallow, rocky river when the ladder slipped off the door. He lost all his front teeth and his lip split from the base of his chin all the way up to the top…like a banana that was just peeled. He was still conscious enough to scream “ambulance”. He also had a concussion, broke his left arm, sprained his right wrist, and injured both knees. Needless to say he did not go back to work.
I got nothing, except to say even though I can’t speak, I really like my lips just as they are. Worker or employer, speak up about safety.
TJ’S STORY
When I was 28, I worked as a self-employed siding/gutter installer. I took a job in Blaine, a city just 25 minutes outside Vancouver in the U.S. I didn’t usually work in the States, but the job would only last a few days, I’d be paid well and the only problem I thought I’d run into (crossing the border in a work vehicle) turned out not to be a problem at all. The house we were working on was 3 stories tall and none of the ladders we had were long enough to reach the top. My solution was to place a ladder on an 8’x8’ scaffolding platform to gain the extra height needed. I had a friend stand on the platform and hold the base of the ladder for stability. I climbed to the top and, with my knees resting against the side of the house, reached the top of the roofline. Then the ladder shifted. My first thought was that everything would be OK; my friend had the ladder. I didn’t realize that it wasn’t the ladder that was tipping over. It was the platform. A second later the ladder gave way and I fell. A remember a moment of being in the air, kicking and clawing wildly for something to hang onto, and then it went black. I woke up on the ground. I had shattered, broken several teeth, broken my pelvis, fractured an eye socket and was covered in blood. The police, the paramedics and fireman arrived (I remember that because I received a bill from each of them when I was home in Vancouver). I had no coverage in the States and it cost thousands in emergency bills. Later, a BC ambulance took me to a hospital in Langley BC where I recovered. I had no income, no compensation and worst of all, the homeowner came to the hospital wondering when I’d be able to finish the job. Can you believe that? It’s not always about working safe. It’s also about working smart.
Here’s an interesting one. The silence here isn’t just TJ and his friend. What about the homeowner? Big responsibility when hiring contractors directly – when you’re acting as general contractor you could be sued for an injury.
But from this report, it sounds like the only thing on this homeowner’s list of things to talk about was the finish date.