105,313Records 71,083Employers 85,290Hospitalizations 27,770Amputations 2015-01-01 2025-10-31
Safety Incidents OSHA Severe Injury Reports · 2015–2025

OSHA Accident Investigation · Summary #903575

AMPUTATED,SHEAR,GUARD,GEAR,HAND

Event
AMPUTATED,SHEAR,GUARD,GEAR,HAND
Linked inspection
No inspection record linked to this accident's victims.
Summary number
903575
Report ID
551800

Event description

HAND AMPUTATED CAUGHT IN DRIVE GEARS OF CORN CHIP SHEETER

Investigation abstract

At 8:45 p.m. on September 22, 1989, Employee #1, a relief operator, was tending a corn chip sheeter machine. The guard on the drive gears had a 2.5 inch by 12 i nch slot opening that was directly over the drive gear. Employee #1 had his left hand resting on the guard. The little finger of Employee #1 entered the slot an d became engaged by the gears pulling the hand through the gears. The left hand was severely damaged over the thumb, fingers, and palm. Employee #1 was transpor ted to Saint Vincent Hospital in Indianapolis, Indiana. The left hand of Employe e #1 was surgically amputated at the wrist.

Victim

  1. #1 Hospitalized Age 20 M

    Nature of injury
    1
    Part of body
    12
    Event type
    2
    Source
    26
    Occupation code
    863
    Human factor
    9
    Environmental factor
    2
    Task assigned
    1

Codes shown verbatim from OSHA's accident-investigation database. A human-readable decoder is coming in a future release once the accident_lookup2 dictionary is loaded.