Share some dumb work mistakes you've made

Let's lighten things up, and laugh at each other a bit. Share an embarrassing mistake. Something that maybe wasn't funny at the time, but now you can all laugh at it.

examples of mine.
-i once cut my hand for 12 stitches because i used a knife with my unsteady left hand instead of right hand, while reaching, because i was too lazy to move the large piece i was cutting, since it happened to be in an awkward environment.
i think about it often when i go to do something lazy.

Or even things you got away with that you shouldn't have done.
-i once, in winter in northern canada, was standing on the tips (not the top rung, but the tops of each vertical ladder side, fully extended) to run hydro from a pole to a house. i was on my toes up there on each peak/point reaching and making it work...And i did, and it was fine... but jesus..... not today... haha....i'd pass.

Oh i once knelt on a stove to finish installing a cabinet. broke the glass stove top. Those aren't cheap!!! haha that's what i learned there....

there are many....... haha......

When I was a kid building a treehouse, I hit my same thumb with a hammer 5 times...……… IN A ROW! Started to smart after awhile.

I snapped my pinky finger in half. Had the ax stuck in a round. Without thinking I grabbes the aledge to drive it through the ax handle came up with corresponding force and broke my ring finger and snapped my pinky. I finished the job (didnt know the extant of injury). Got home and out my head on the table from pain. My wife was actually scared. Figured it would get better, took some IB profen. Two days later I finally went into urgent care. Nurses were shocked.

Was rolling 1 1/2 steel bars, 12 feet long. My wife was helping me. Naturally I wanted to show her how strong I was (in our 20s) so I twisted and was putting all my force into pushing the 12' rods back through the dies. One rod fell off the rest and stopped dead on the head. With all my 25 year old force I slammed my inner elbow joint into that 1 1/2 rod. Blew up my arm. I was Black and bkue from my wrist to my pecs. Foe the next 6 months (3 months of therapy) I couldnt straighten my right arm.

Finished the job without My wife with one hand. Walked into the office where she was waiting and nearly passed out lol

Too many to count lol. My Dad built bridges for the county, Mom used to say they kept his medical records under the desk at the emergency room to save time..... I got it honest lol. What gets me is when I think " I probably shouldn't be doing this" which is immediately followed by blood, pain, or a combination of the two

Sometimes too much of this....can turn into:

That!

I've left lugnuts loose once, but didn't ever so it again

One time I worked on an F450 dump truck and put the wheels back on with a torque wrench. I noticed that they seemed awful tight all the way down the threads,but didn't think much of it. Two days later it was sitting in the lot with both back wheels fallen off; the lugs weren't tight and the studs sheared off. To make matters worse, it had a full load of dirt, so when I jacked it up, the jack cracked the asphalt pavement right in front of the entrance. Needless to say, the boss was (This word is unacceptable on Trapperman).

I used to have a habit or resting my hand on the tire as the car went up on the lift, until one time I had the car in drive going up so I could listen for a wheel bearing and I stuck my hand into the spinning wheel. It ripped the nail off my trigger finger and smashed it down to about 1/8" thick. Ouch.

7 big hard maple from 1 stump,knew things were goin bad and watched it all unfold seemingly in slow motion from a safe distance.

Lol same here!

i own stock in super glue,ive used so much on myself.

Just recently I cut a 15' butt section off a 35' telephone pole while it was sitting on top of a stack of other poles. Very quickly the cut off section rolled off the stack and landed flush on my left pinky toe. I did the one legged hop while cussing myself out. Within minutes my toe was double in size and three shades of purple/black! Glad I was wearing a cheap pair of tennis shoes because a smart person should never take chances!

Chris

Dumbest thing I did at work was date the women there.

Rookies!! I had drained the oil in a Mack truck engine once. While it was draining, I figured I'd put some grease in some auto-tarper fittings that had been needing greased. I squirted some grease in each side, then figured I'd start the engine and run the tarper back and forth a few times to get the grease spread around. After back and forth a few times, the engine slowed down and seized.....still draining the oil. Engine, injector pump, air compressor, turbo.......30,000 dollars. Still kept my job!!!

One cold november day out on the line,I jumped down onto some floating muskeg(Its like a big sponge,didnt know it was floating).It started going down slowly and I couldn't jump back up on the bank cause it would just give under me.
Down I went slowly into about 8 feet of water with hip boots on.I swam/crawled to the bank and crawled up the bank to the bike.It was freezing weather and I was about 10 miles from the truck.That was the coldest 4 wheeler ride I have ever done.

I may have tried to remove a brake drum from a car with the park brake set once. I beat on that thing for a long time before I remembered. Needless to say, the drum needed turning after that.

Dumbest thing I've ever done at work was show up!

I started to make a list but my computer run out of memory.

About 20 years ago me and my crew were setting up scaffold on a barn restoration. My guys were complaining about the condition of my walker planks. I was standing on top of a three stack (15 feet) and had just set the fourth set. I began jumping up and down on the middle of a plank yelling at my workers to “Look how strong they are you bunch of sissies now get to work!”

The plank broke and I tore up my knee when I hit the ground, it gives me trouble to this day.

There were brand new, OSHA approved planks on the job the next day.

Ha! SMH

Ince I couldnt figure out why my old jalopy wasnt starting. Seoent a whole Saturday trouble shooting. My dad casually strolls in and asksnif it has gas. "Of course it does!" I answer....well...yeah....I forgot to fill her up.

I had a side job doing demo work in an old house when I was about 24.
I was pulling lath and plaster off the walls to prep for drywall.
I had my claw hammer behind about 3 strips of lath trying to pry out the nails when the plaster at the other end have way because those nails had rusted through. The lath snapped back like a bow limb LOL and it had about a 2lb chunk of plaster still attached to the business end. It clubbed me in the temple about as hard as I've ever been hit and knocked me out. I woke up covered in plaster dust and my own blood... but otherwise OK

Last Tuesday I was taking apart some pallet racking by myself. Top rails were 10 feet high. First one came off no problem. Second one I released one end, standing on an 8 foot ladder I held the 40 pound rail up in the middle and smacked the other end of the rail loose with a hammer. Rail came off my hand, smacked me in the mouth and punched my bottom teeth through my lip. Lucky I didn't lose any teeth. If I had gone one step further up the ladder it wouldn't have happened. Can't eat, time to start a diet.

I generally worked alone, so anytime I had a passenger I got distracted with conversation easy. Well, one day it started snowing those flakes the size of a walnut and I had my supervisor doing a ride along, we were BSing and I backed right into a random pole in a field that I never saw. It didn’t do much damage at all to the bumper and he just laughed, but I sure felt cool...

Taking down a 24’ scaffold pick supported through 3 windows, 3rd floor. Removed one end support and then walked back out onto the pick. Great ride....

I put the wheels on my boss's truck with an electric impact and didn't check them by hand. The wheels came off while the boss's son was pulling a trailer the next day on a stretch of highway with a sharp 8-10 ft ditch. Fortunately he kept it on the road. Now I check everything by hand no matter what tool put them on.

I was trying to start a cold-blooded diesel piece of equipment in the winter, so I left a jet heater blowing into the grill. I forgot the grill was plastic... melted it. This particular machine was about 30 years old, European and rare to begin with. It never got a new grill.
My first day on my first real construction job when when I was 17, we were demoing some windows. The boss told me to stand outside and catch the window while he cut the foam insulation around it from the inside. I had my hands up on the sides of the window and he stuck his long insulation knife through the crack right into my hand. He felt terrible and we got along great after that.

I covered my mouth half way through that first paragraph as i read....

I was using my pocket knife for something and set it down on the seat of the forklift I was operating. Someone called for something on the radio so I jump up in the seat and yeeeow! Jumped down and did a circle like a dog chasing its tail trying to reach what was causing the pain in my backside. Finally got ahold of it and pulled it out. Had it stuck in pretty deep in the old butt cheek.

Didn't happen at work, but made work tough for awhile because I was limping: Was digging potatoes in the garden. Decided to take a break, so stabbed the potato fork into the ground...except my foot was in the way.

Too many to remember. Most recent one that comes to mind from last year... 140' long greenhouse with electric roll up sides, wind lashing rope got caught in the pipe as it was rolling up, blew the fuses and it was jammed. Went to cut the rope with my pocket knife without thinking about how much pressure it was under, touched the knife to the rope and the whole thing exploded, pipe hit me square in the forehead like a mule kick. I landed on my back with lights flashing in my vision and blood running into eyes. It's good to think before you act.

The winter before I was making a new bowsprit for a tourist schooner in town with another guy. I was using a slide hammer to pull some stiuck hardware off the old sprit. Straddled it for a better angle, brought it home with everything I had, and caught a huge chunk on the inside of my thigh in the process. Left a blood blister the size of a #4 Victor pan. Took a long time to heal.

All of them?

I guided hunts on a ranch in south Texas after college. Took a guy from Bowtech Archery, head of R&D. He shot a buck, hit it far back so we left to give it some time to expire. In the mean time I took him to a feeder in a sendero that always had hogs on it. We stalked in, finally got within range. He smoked one. They all ran, except one. He handed me his bow and said here shoot him! So I drew and BANG POW the bow limb split, string came off the cam. I never drew an arrow! Oh man my heart sank I coulda puked!!!

Lesson learned, first things first!

John

For starters, showing up on time...to get nowhere fast.
One time when I first started pulling triples, I left my last two trailers in the yard and didn’t realize til the dispatcher asked if I forgot something. My answer was no by the way.
I’ve pulled out from under a fully loaded trailer with the landing gear up..
worked as a printing press operator when I was a teen. My registration was off and I thought I could just give the paper a tug over and it sucked my fingers into the dies. Thankfully it was a two stamp label so they only got smashed twice.
Worked at a mobile phone call center in my teens....that was a mistake all together.
I worked at a gas station in my early teens back when some still had auto shops. I worked the grave shift, don’t ask. I was told I could work on my truck if I wanted. I ended up doing discount tire repair and used tire sales until someone came back during the day, when the owner was there, looking for the used tire sale. Made good money til I got caught.
Yeah looking back I realize I did a lot of things with little thought. I’m still kickin though. Learned a lot and still have all my fingers....a couple don’t work quite right but they are there.

Let’s just say the buck sheep wasn’t pinned up correctly and when I turned around that fence I figured that out pretty quick.

Agreed. Same with me, I have never made a dum work mistake., Shot myself with nail gun once, big deal, I don't do them, I don't do dangerous work, they don't pay enough, about the dumbest thing I do now is burn my lungs out on disenfectant cleaning, the dumbest thing, is like u say, since long work job end over 4 yrs back, the dumbest thing is show up an work for cheap jew employers. I had it with it , an like be done with it

I didn't fill out the application.
Like Coonman I was looking for the perfect less stressful job.
Two weeks before Thanksgiving I found the help wanted ad I had been dreaming about.
So I went straight to Victoria Secrets in Joliet, Illinois to inquire about the opening for a fitting room assistant.
The lady hiring told me I would have to go to Bismark, North Dakota
I said " oh, do they have an opening there ?"
She said " No, that's where you get in line for an application!"

^^^ha ha ha!!!

loaded a 1980 pound coil of 1/4x 31/8 mild steel on the decoiler and cut the bands without putting the fingers on that holds the coil in place.
i plain out ran it getting out of the cage the decoiler sets in. took two forkllifts to get what ran off in the floor up and scrap it after i cut it off with a portaband

Went to tend to my lobster boat one day after a heavy rain. Pulled the plug to drain it and figured I'd check my coyote traps while I waited. Fast forward 12 hours later to 2am when I realized I never put the plug back in. Drove to the boat to find it sitting on the flats after the tide had gone back out. Had to pickle the motor at 3am.

I have gotten tractors stuck multiple times. Sorry to say- I don't have as exciting workplace drama like some of you.

no one's better at buryin a skid steer than me Run.

When I first started working HVAC I installed a pitch pocket upside down and filled it with tar. A pitch pocket is used on a flat roof it’s a metal box that is sealed to the roof and the power wires and refrigerant lines for air conditioning run up through and then you fill the top three inches of the box with tar or roofing sealant to make it weather proof. It sticks up above the roof about a foot. I installed it upside down so it was sticking down into the building a foot and filled it with roofing tar luckily without any pipes or wires in it. My boss really laughed at me and it was easy fix . But I never repeated that mistake.

Too many of them and I’ll leave it at that.

I was the maintenance supervisor at work and also had a grounds crew. Two guys on the grounds crew had been messing around with this mower deck all morning and I was frustrated watching them not make much progress. So...I walked out onto the shop floor and said "Let me show you how to do this". Never say that.

I got a piece of pipe and slipped it over the end of a big coil spring that held the weight of the mower. With a big, hard push, I pushed that pipe up over my head to put tension on the spring. The mower had a metal canopy and I hooked the end of the pipe behind that canopy to hold the pipe. I bent over and the pipe broke free. It hit me in the head. I went down. I don't know if I lost consciousness - if I did it was brief. I staggered to my feet with blood pouring down my face and soaking my shirt.

My work truck was parked in the shop a few feet away. I always had a pile of parts and tools on my passenger seat. One of the guys in the shop opened the passenger door, my stuff was thrown on the shop floor in a pile and the guys put me in the truck.

On the drive to the hospital I felt the wound on my head and it was deep - at least it felt deep. I told the driver I think I have a hole in my skull. He started passing cars as fast as my truck would go.

Turned out I had just compressed the fat layer between the skull and skin and that was the divot I felt. The skin was damaged too badly from the impact for the doctor to be able to put any stitches in. They shaved a section of my scalp, took x-rays, and bandaged me up.

When I got back to the shop, that piece of pipe had been wrapped in foam pipe insulation and was sitting in my office and there was a hard hat sitting in my truck's seat waiting for me.

Too many of them and I’ll leave it at that.
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Oh Festus , Oh Festus don't take no purty woman's word
Don't let her make no city fool out of you
Squeeze em and tease em and build yer self a herd
Then you can cull one out if you want to

We used to have Hyster races on night shift. One time we my supervisor and I were doing our laps. We came down to the last lap and we were neck and neck...... Well as they say rubbin' is racin' and I started rubbing against him trying to push him off the course. Well I hit him just right in the back quarter and his rear-end kinda went squirrelly and he over corrected and ended up driving the fork through a support beam. He stopped dead. I raised my hands in victory and proceeded to slam into the steps leading up to the break room.

We both got a serious butt chewing and a week off work without pay. It took them 2 days to get the steps fixed and about a week to get the beam replaced. When he retired a couple years later they gave him a piece of beam with a cut off fork through it as a gift. The plant manager had a pretty good sense of humor and had them cut it up to give to him. It sits on his mantle.

Backing the long fire truck into the station at a station hadn't worked at for few years. Was there taking a shift of OT.. Had drove that truck many times as it was my rig when new, to department.. Then they stole it moved it to that station because was better than one they had....So anyway was messing line up backing into a bay that hadn't back into for some time. But was also messing up again for like third time during same shift.. Just couldn't get my ground marks right for some reason.. So got lined up goofy coming in officer gets excited after my messing up earlier yells stop??? So I do.. he say you to close on this side....I'm thinking get your head out of my mirror maybe I'd seen that.. Looking in my mirror I'm close to the wall but got plenty day light. So I throw thing back in drive and pull forward take another whack at it..
Doppie me turns the wheel as pull forward and swings that to close hind end of the rig over.. Pull the flag stone facing right off the front of the building. That door been hit may times by lots of guys. I got to be the first to pull the stone off the wall..Makes a pretty loud sound shattering on concrete drive.
This was all right after I came back to work from cancer surgery...
So now I'm on the carpet in chiefs office.. He says to me you had lot trouble driving today?? Me! Well maybe backing in?? Are your eyes ok form the cancer stuff? did you maybe come back to work to soon??? I told em well I may have come back to work to soon.. But my eye's were fine the doc had cut up my asre not my eye's..I thought that was funny...
So I got to be first guy written up 3 times in one shift and while on OT no less...It really is funny how it all happened..Was a long 24 hours..
Had the chief put note in my file before I left that day, not to call me ever again for OT. Never worked any OT again rest of the year a half I worked before cancer took me out again.

Mac

Was a telephone repairman and ran up a pole like a spider monkey in an alley behind some houses and when I put one foot down and hooked my left arm on the pole to put my climbing belt around the pole I heard a crack. You know the sound right before you yell. Timber! Well, the pole fell back and then the cable that was deadended on it got tight and stopped it falling and made it swing in a half circle before falling over and ripping drops out of 2 houses on it's way down. I went flying off and landed on a garage roof that gave a lot when I landed on it. All my tools fell out of my tool pouch and rolled off the roof. A guy was mowing and came running over and asked if I was ok and I was in shock for a minute and didn't know what to say. It was a tall garage and he had to get a ladder for me to get down. I was lucky for sure.

Dated women.

Although, there was 1 woman I dated years ago that I remain friends with. That was 15+ years ago

Forty years ago...I was a motorman pulling a trip of 25 loaded cars out of a mine. I was on the steepest final grade and could see daylight outside. My usual locomotive was in the shop, and I was using an ancient 18 ton model, no air or dynamic brakes like my normal motor. My tail motorman radioed me that he jumped track back at the loading section, and wasn’t behind me. Instead of keep going, I let off on the controller. I knew I had just made a BIG mistake. Within seconds, the car couplers were slapping backwards and I was getting pulled down the hill....fast. Without dynamic braking, there was no chance of stopping the trip. I opened my track sanders, wound the brake wheel tight, and bailed off.

I got to my feet, and starting walking down the track, expecting the worse. To my amazement, I found my motor and trip a half mile away, at the bottom of the hill, all still on track. My buddy then showed up with his tail motor.....his response...” you didn’t have to come back to help me, I could get back on track myself”. I never told him that I didn’t come back to help him.

Shelling corn a few years ago, we was losing kernels out the weep holes in the corn head. Me and my buddy got under there with duct tape and each had a few holes to tape. I got mine done and jumped in the combine, put the head down....and thank the good lord the safety latch was on cause he was still under there. I got out gave him a hug and apologized profusely, smoked a cigarette and took a reality check and a long break.