EARTH QUAKE

   / EARTH QUAKE #31  
Thanks bird. The burns are pretty painful, thank god for pain killers! I'm a real bad when it comes to pain, doctors, hospitals, er's. Bad enough it will shut my body down, pass out /w3tcompact/icons/crazy.gif. Could have been a lot worse, at least I'm home with my wife and son and NOT in a burn treatment center having grafs done.
 
   / EARTH QUAKE #32  
Skin grafts, must have been a whole lot of hot steel. That make mine look like sore. My first time with burns over this large of an area. I have had the quarter sized burn from using cutting torches overhead. It's a good story/lesson on how it happened. It was a careless error on my part. I was doing a timing belt, front crank seal/oil pump seal, tune-up on a Subaru Outback. I basically got the belt and seals done had finished with the tune-up. The only thing left was to clean the cloaking from the throttle blades on the intake. On this car it is easier to remove the battery to replace the spark plugs. So after installing the battery, its tray and hold-downs I hooked up the battery. Normally the battery is disconnected. The only thing left was the throttle blade cleaning, so I hooked up the battery, was working in that area with the tools right there. On the Outback the throttle body points back at the firewall of the car. So I have a mirror I place against the firewall and work from the front of the car. As I was cleaning the bottom of the can (outside reinforcement ring) just caught a small piece of the B+ wire eyelet that the safety rubber cap doesn't cover. This is on the starter. The side of the can grounded and created a small hole that all the "stuff" came out and ignited. I don't remember much just one hell of a roar and bright orange, I didn't pass out, but my father said the front of the car was a bright orange ball of fire. So off to the ER I went. I will admit it was my carelessness that led to this. I have done this cleaning procedure on dozens of new Subaru's (they all have the same engine layout) even with the battery connected. I'm also known as the safety police at work. I'm always wearing hearing protection, safety glasses, gloves either leather or nitrile (non latex), always using safety lock, jack stands etc, etc. So even if you do everything safely you still need to pay attention. As a note every single ingredient in that cleaner can is highly flammable. The luck that made me lucky is the can was 3/4 empty. I had a full one on the bench to finish up the job once the other ran out.

I did go to the ER but have seem a DR for wound checks. This guy practices medicine between "mainstream medicine" and holistic medicine, basically he uses what works. This guy has basically "cured" my moderate bilateral carpal tunnel with out any surgery. If any one has interest I can start a new post.
 
   / EARTH QUAKE #33  
Getting better by the minute. If I don't get an infection (which looks good at this point) I'm almost on the down hill.

So/w3tcompact/icons/hmm.gif..... that's how one meets up with cute li'l gals/w3tcompact/icons/grin.gif!

Let me get this straight. You (and the cure li'l gal/w3tcompact/icons/wink.gif)would be holding onto the wall, the wall would then move a foot /w3tcompact/icons/shocked.gif away, you would try to get back to the wall, it would hit you. /w3tcompact/icons/shocked.gifOuch/w3tcompact/icons/shocked.gif But you knew that.

That's way too freaky. Just the noise and rattling here Saturday was enough for me!

Pics are alway welcomed by me anyways.
 
   / EARTH QUAKE #34  
Dang boy someone was looking out for you. It could of been alot worse than that. It goes without saying no burn is painless. But I've been told that a deep second degree hurts more than a third degree. They all hurt. But at the burncenter they called mine a band-aid burn. Cuz they are used to dealing with real bad and high percentage burns. So for me it was only my fore arms that got it the worst The side of my face was second degree and has now no signs that I was ever burned on my face. Of course the arms will always be a reminder of someone else being unsafe. But you can't change history. I've just got to be real careful to use sunscreen on them. /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif

Mine happend when I worked at a marina. We used to do repowers and bed engines. So at times we had to make completly new beds for the engines to sit on. We would cherry the steel at times to give it a bend so it would fit either the hull or the engine depending on the need. Alot of this work was done in the shop.

Well I came through the workbay with my arms full and the knucklehead had the cutting torch leads across the walkway. Guess what, I slipped and down I went. First thing once I knew I couldn't stop was to protect my hands so my forearms took the brunt of it. Simple as that. I was out of work for a few months then had to wear these jobe socks on my arms for another year. They are sort of like real heavy support hose for women. Makes it real hot for wrenching in summer.

The stay at the burn center over in Baltamore was a story in itself. NO FUN. Two weeks of living he**. Something I wouldn't wish on anyone and I only had small burns, some people were not only burned on the outside but their lungs were burnt as well. nuthin nice.

So it could have been alot worse for me as well. I could have gotten third degree burns on my face as well. But like both you and myself, sure would have been better for nothing to happen. No matter how safe you are at work, stuff happens./w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif

But in my case the person knew better. That was supposed to be done further back in the shop. Walkways were always supposed to have nothing going across them. The boss was up pretty good on keeping the shop safe. The other techs reasoning was that he was in a hurry to get a job done so he didn't have time to move the setup back further in the shop cuz the forklift was busy at the other end of the marina.

Hope your feeling much better oh and if you do get to feeling down at all about what happened just take a quick peek at the picture that I've attached to this post. It's of my right forearm.

Just remember to give the mrs and your 4mth old a big hug! You will be good as new in no time. So that doc is doing well with that carpel tunnel that you've got huh?
Gordon
 
   / EARTH QUAKE #35  
Guess it helps when you attach a picture to actually attach a picture. Ok here it is it's of my right forearm

Gordon
 

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   / EARTH QUAKE #36  
Ok here is one more. This one is clearer and not as large.

Gordon
 

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   / EARTH QUAKE #37  
Yikes, Derek! You and Gordon have literally tasted hell, and I'm betting neither one of you wants a return visit. /w3tcompact/icons/tongue.gif

Back to the earthquake --

<font color=blue>Just the noise and rattling here Saturday was enough for me! </font color=blue>

Try to imagine the sounds that went along with the attached pictures of the building I was working in when the Loma Prieta earthquake struck.
crazy.gif
 

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   / EARTH QUAKE #39  
I knew there was a reason I moved back to the northeast from the west coast.
 
   / EARTH QUAKE #40  
And if those pictures don't creep you out enough, attached is a copy I saved of the Gary Larson Far Side page-a-day calendar for the same day (next day following quake) that I was taking pictures.
crazy.gif


BTW -- I took those pictures early the morning after the quake. Although I walked into the building and made my way to the fifth floor easily enough, it was two days later that the city's structural engineers declared that the building was not going to collapse, and it was safe to enter. /w3tcompact/icons/shocked.gif
 

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