[ponjohn]

Originally Posted by lust4speed

I haven't told the story here, but did have that catastrophic accident with a Mark VIII fan when it came loose during testing and my hand was literally eaten by the blades. Had to have three fingers put back together and back on the hand, and spent a week in the hospital. While the event seemed like an explosion, the fan cut through my fingers about every inch until the blades were gone. The fan went into my hand from the radiator side and pulled it in, and neither the fan nor I faired that well. I was very fortunate that one of the best hand surgeons possibly in the world was on duty that evening and he took on the challenge with his surgical team. It was his first night back at the hospital after a three week speaking tour. The emergency room doctor had already told me that they would just clean up the hand and amputate the fingers back to good flesh and bone. Just after he told me that, a couple of young doctors came in and said they were looking for a challenge for their surgical team, and I was definitely it.

The fan blade still hangs over my workbench as a reminder to try and not be a dumbass. It's been a little over 10 years and the arthritis is settling in like they warned me, but I have full use of the fingers. Dropped a lot of nuts and bolts for the first two years but surprisingly have almost full feeling in the fingers now. The X-ray was taken just after we walked into emergency and we had gathered up parts and wrapped them up with the hand in a not-so-sanitary towel, and they just took the X-ray through the wrapped up towel.

My wife is an OR nurse and I showed her your xray. She said " what did he get it stuck in". That's a serious injury.