Watch Your Other Hand

Next to your eyes, your hands are probably the most important part of your body when it comes to doing your work. Your hands are your wage-earners. They’re precious.

National Safety Council accident statistics show that the fingers and hands are among the most frequently injured parts of the body. This is not surprising, because our hands are involved in almost everything we do.

Humans are superior to other animals because they have developed their brains and have far greater dexterity in the use of their hands. When you think about it, it’s amazing what we can do with four fingers and a thumb.

By contrast, it’s always tragic to learn how much someone’s life is affected by the loss of fingers or a hand.

Many of the things we do with our hands are done without any deliberate thought. Have you ever noticed that we all tend to keep both hands busy in some way? Often, if only one hand is needed to perform a job, we unconsciously do something with the other hand. It may idly grasp something or be placed in an unsafe position. Punch presses are designed with two-button controls to keep that other hand out of trouble.

To avoid electrical shock when it is necessary to work near a live electrical contact, some electricians put their idle hand in a pocket. This keeps them from accidentally placing the idle hand on another live contact or a ground. Either action could result in current passing through the body’s vital organs if the working hand inadvertently touches a live contact.

Here are two examples of what can happen when a worker forgets to keep an idle hand out of the danger zone:

• An employee was walking past a conveyor that was driven by a sprocket and chain. The chain was guarded on the outside, the top, and the bottom–but not on the inside toward the frame of the machine, The employee stopped next to the conveyor to talk with a co-worker. While talking, he placed his gloved hand on top of the guard, curling his fingers around the metal. The glove protruded under the guard and was caught by the chain. His hand was pulled between the chain and the sprocket.

• In another incident, an assembler was working on a machine with a rotating mechanism. Her job was to place piece parts in the fixture immediately in front of her.  When the parts were in place, she pressed a start button with her right hand so the machine would rotate, taking the parts into position for automatic welding and bringing the next fixture in front of her for loading.  One day, she pressed the button as usual but placed that idle left hand in such a position that her fingers were caught in the rotating mechanism.

These two examples are vivid reminders that we must always watch the idle hand. Sooner or later it can caught in trouble.