Inspection Detail

Inspection: 305348229 - The Orman Grubb Co

Inspection Information - Office: Santa Ana District Office

Investigation Summary

On October 2, 2002, Employee #1 of the Orman Gribb Company was working on Voodwood shaper and sander woodworking machine, Model A111, Serial Number 1633, which is identified by the employer as station number 407. This machine has one shaper or cutter element and two sander discs. This machine is used for rounding off the edges of wooden planks of various sizes. Wooden planks are fed one at a time into the automatic feed of the machine. The cutter first cuts the corners on the planks, then the sanders smoothes them out. Cutter and the sanders are mostly covered by hoods for the wood chips and dust collection system. At the time of this accident, the three points of operation were not properly guarded. The hoods for the dust collection system left about 1.5-in. gaps, exposing the points of operations from the top. At the time of this accident, Employee #1 had just finished making some adjustments to the machine and he tried to feel the smoothness of the edge of the plank with his fingers in the area where the material was still being worked on by the sander discs. His left middle finger was pulled into the point of operation of the first sander and was crushed. Employee #1 was hospitalized where his finger surgically amputated at the second knuckle.

Keywords: AMPUTATED, FINGER, GUARD, PLANK, CRUSHED, WOOD SHAPER, UNGUARDED