Inspection Detail

Inspection: 309303600 - Sps Technologies, Llc

Inspection Information - Office: Santa Ana District Office

Investigation Summary

At approximately 5:30 a.m. on October 23, 2008, Employee #1 was employed by a company that manufactured metal fasteners for the aerospace industry. She was instructed by her supervisor to continue work on the job she started the day before, using a B18 Single Snow Tap (0.5 inch, 20 Tap, Model Number TA-3-A, and Serial Number 35187-9). Employee #1 tapped threads into a self-locking, 0.687 in. diameter, 0.485 in. high floating nut. After tapping several self-locking, floating nuts, Employee #1 noticed that the threads were more difficult to tap into the nut than usual. Employee #1 then called over a coworker to help fix the problem. The coworker adjusted some of the air gauges to help solve the problem. Employee #1 then removed the self-locking floating nut from the collet (device that holds the nut in place) and began brushing off debris and shavings from the collet using her left hand. The tap head suddenly came down, without warning, onto the worker's left pinky finger. The coworker manually lifted the tap head so that Employee #1 could pull her finger out. She suffered a laceration and fracture to her left pinky finger at the lower joint, and was taken to a hospital by ambulance. The injury did not require hospitalization.

Keywords: FRACTURE, FINGER, CLEANING, EQUIPMENT FAILURE, LOCKOUT, CAUGHT BETWEEN, LACERATION, STRUCK BY, FALLING OBJECT