I was bucking a pine I had just dropped to clear out some more space in the backyard. I failed to notice that a limb about 3 inches and 4 ft long. across was laying over a previously bucked section of log. I finished the cut I was making and the freshly bucked log fell on the limb. Effectively creating a see saw effect and slamming the limb in my face. I wasn't wearing a helmet with a face shield but I was wearing safety glasses. Probably the only thing that saved my eye.

I'm a lightweight when it comes to cutting, used to cut firewood down and dead while out west.

Same time and place I once crewed for a ground interhospital transfer. Guy was cutting wood, hot spring day, plenty of liquids to rehydrate, let me change that, lot of beer.

Anyhow, he was holding the saw off the ground, he was a big guy, and pulling the rope. Well, it started, same time he pulled it back. Into his chin, throat and chest area. Local ambulance from the reservation (he was a member) transported him to our local hospital. The reservation had only one ambulance so we normally did their transfers to Albuquerque. Local doctor made the decision for him to go.

This guy was mummy wrapped from navel to his forehead. Spring day in the 80's and guess what, over halfway to Albuquerque the A/C in the ambulance goes away.

Three years ago I managed to cut my leg with a rather large Stihl saw. I was helping a buddy who was clearing land at the time. We had to square up some logs that he was taking to the mill. He had the logs in the grapple to load and I was cutting just the very ends to make the correct length. I forgot to clear the piece from my last cut and stepped on it as the saw was slowing down. The bar just bumped my leg and I didn't realize I had been cut until I saw the hole in my pants. Luckily, I only ended up with 13 stitches across my left knee and no lasting injuries. Two inches either way would have put the saw into my shin or thigh.

I had on every bit of PPE that I could have that day except for chaps. They were in the truck and it didn't even cross my mind to put them on. For some reason I just forgot them. I haven't ran a chainsaw since, and have no desire to.

I worked in a logging camp for a short while at the age of 19. Long enough to know I would not make it my life's work. But almost everyone of the old timers I worked with was missing a part, or had a limp.

I own four Stihl chainsaws here on the ranch, and always wear Stihl chaps, helmet with face protection, boots, and gloves when using the saws. I use a Dremel tool with chainsaw sharpening attachment to sharpen the chains. It is important to keep your chainsaw blades sharp, and properly adjusted for tension, both for performance and safety. You have to understand how kickback occurs and use the saw in a way that minimizes kickback. Read the book.

I fell and dispose of a couple trees a year, but we were hit by major hurricanes two years in a row, and we had to deal with around 400 downed trees on the property. Many of the trees fell into our hayfields and we had to get them up ASAP. I'm talking about running a chainsaw 8 hours a day for weeks. If I had not been wearing hearing protection I am sure I would now be stone deaf.

I am extremely careful with my saws, and it makes me cringe seeing guys in shorts and flip flops on the news cutting up downed trees after a storm. I asked the National Public Health Service docs who were deployed here to staff our country ER after the hurricane what injuries they were seeing from the storm. You guessed it: No injuries from the storm, but lots of chainsaw injuries to the feet, legs, and face. As safety conscious as I am, I have twice had to replace my chaps from an inadvertent cut. I remember thinking at the time, I was sure glad I was wearing those chaps. It is not good to run a saw when you are tired. The way the chaps work, there are fine Kevlar fibers sewn between two layers of canvas. If the canvas is cut, the fibers bind up the blade and make it stop. I have also been hit in the face with flying debris where the face shield saved the day.

One more thing: know what you are doing before you start the thing.

I was with my grandfather when we were trimming his wood lot, when he had his accident.

Someone was "spiking" trees (treehuggers driving nails into the trunk where they would be sawn, to discourage logging) and he hit one of the spikes while he was doing a back cut using the top of the saw... It drove the saw back towards him and the saw flipped cutting into his leg.

Luckily it wasn't too deep, and I was able to drive us down to the property abutter that was able to bandage the leg and call authorities.

The Forest Rangers found over 20 trees that had been spiked, but they determined that it had been done long ago, so no investigation into who might have done it could be done.

My Grandfather has passed now, but I still remember that day clearly. While I'm very cautious with my cuts (I will only do bottom cuts on standing wood), I don't wear chaps for the amount I do. I do wear a hard hat with face shield, gloves and goggles though.

Edited to add - I also won't cut alone. Just like working on a ladder, I want someone else there to call for help if things go wrong.

No chainsaw accidents, but I did manage to cut myself pretty good with a hand saw while sawing limbs off a downed log while camping.

I was tired, and working fast and sloppy. Limb snapped right as I was sawing it, swinging my left hand into the path of the blade right as I was pushing hard on a saw stroke. Happened so fast that I couldn't abort in time. The saw blade chewed a deep, 2" gash diagonally across the top of my left thumb at the middle knuckle. Somehow, I miraculously missed severing any ligaments. I cleaned it, closed it with paper stitches, and splinted and bandaged it. Probably should have gone to the ER for real stitches, but I was a broke college student. It ended up working out. Had some nerve damage (bolts of "cold lightning") in that thumb for a few months, but that eventually subsided. No permanent loss of feeling or range of motion, but it's a pretty noticeable scar.

quote:

Originally posted by bryan11:
While cutting apart some branches, a cut piece relieved some tension and sent the bar toward my lower leg where it cut through the outer layer of my coveralls. It was a close call and a reminder to be careful.

Kind of similar deal. Finishing a cut and fatigued, I let the the bar drop faster than I expected, tore open my heavy winter pants from the crotch, down the inside of the thigh to below the knee. A fast revving saw doesn't stop immediately. No skin touched, I sewed up the pants as a constant reminder. Despite that, I'm more worried about not being surprised by what I'm cutting.

quote:

Three years ago I managed to cut my leg with a rather large Stihl saw.

I have knicked a leg a few times over the years. Nothing serious, but it can happen easily and before you know it. Canvas clothing including over-alls does nothing to slow a blade.
I mostly wear chaps now.

No injuries to myself, can't say the same about my garage though!

Backing away as the tree began to fall I tripped on a rock, the idling down saw contacted my thigh. Thankfully it was just idling down and I was wearing jeans with a heavy, insulated Carthart suit. I saw the "ditch" it had cut through the suit and didn't feel a thing so assumed that's as far as it went but then area started getting wet with blood, and the pain started. Only cut about 1/8" deep but it seemed like it took forever to heal over.
More recently, I picked a 70-75' standing dead oak tree, the little branches had already fallen off so it was just the trunk and a few larger limbs with most of the bark gone. As it just started leaning I pulled the saw out and stepped back, the tree broke in half about 2/3 the way up and hinged back the opposite direction the tree was falling and down came the 25' top. The 6" diameter broken end hit less than 6' from me.

6 years ago - my one and only accident (knock on wood).

A tornado had passed over my in-laws place and I was helping clear the lot of trees. I'd spent all day with the chainsaw (my FIL's 30+ year old Stihl) and the crazy part was that I was actually done cutting when it happened.

I had finished cutting and was trying to navigate some fallen limbs to get out from around the tree. For whatever reason, I didn't shut the saw down. Either the clutch was messed up, or it was idling a little too high - but as I swing the saw to get out, I clipped my leg. The blade must have had one last rotation in it as I do remember seeing the blade stopped right after I "scratched" myself.

At first I thought I just scratched my leg with the stationary blade, but as I peered into the cut in my pants, I knew it was a little worse.
Luckily I had a proper IFAK in my car and got my wife to fetch it. Bandaged myself up and off we went to the ER for stitches.

The "after" pic...

no,

have I been injured while felling a tree ,
yes.

and yes ,
we should have
"called the man"

No accident involving chain cutting me - several wacks from flying branches and chips. I wear rx glasses so the chips arent so bad but getting beaned by the branches hurts and cuts.

BTW - Electric or Battery saws defeat the chaps as the torque is 100% when running. The fibers in the clutch is what makes chaps work for gas saws. So Beware!

I was about 40 feet up in a Locust tree removing limbs to take the whole tree down. After I cut one of the limbs, my saw was forced down onto my leg and I received a 3 inch cut right above my knee. I bandaged myself up and went to go see my father, who was a physician. He sutured my wound and I was out of commission for a few weeks.

One of my employees cut his leg while removing underbrush. Cutting tangled up brush and limbs seems to be the most dangerous activity to do with a chainsaw.

Just recently, one of my employees avoided having a severe leg injury because his protective chaps stopped the saw.



If you are going to run a chainsaw, protective chaps is the best $100 you could ever spend.

A friend showed up in high school one day with stitches down his forehead and across his nose. The chainsaw he was using kicked back. He was lucky.

We used to gather wood from where the power company would keep lines clear...uphill or downhill to throw a cable on a log while dad winched it up, carried the saw to free the logs.
Only injury was from slipping footing on wet logs or the such, managed to toss the saw or drop it , so just twisted ankles.

I’ve always had a great fear of a chainsaw and after I got big , if I was using one I used chaps, gloves and face/eye pro.

quote:

I had on every bit of PPE that I could have that day except for chaps.

Twice. When I was a seasonal with the Forest Service we used to “thin” in the fall. That meant cutting out small diameter Subalpine fir (Piss fir) from stands of Lodgepole and Doug fir. We had the old Homelite, “a product of Textron Industries,” chainsaws and they were outfitted with a beavertail bar. OSHA has since outlawed them as dangerous for kickback.


Not a great picture, and the Homelites weren’t quite so antique looking. See the spike projecting from the bar, just below the arc at the end of the blade? They were fast for small diameter trees, just push the end of the saw into the tree in the notch between the spike and the rotating chain. You barely had to bend over.

I was thinning in the snow. Had just dropped a tree and slipped on a snow covered branch. I dropped the saw out of the way (I thought) and my left hand landed on the chain as it was coming to a stop. Zip! Through my glove and essentially a one tooth cut just below my little finger. Very visible scar though.

The second was more recent, and there was no injury. I straightened up as my saw was winding down and contacted my chaps on my right thigh. Not injured at all, but I still consider it a chainsaw accident.

Guy i used to work with, had a side gig tree cutting.
He wore minimal PPE. Maybe googles and a pair of jeans.
Chain snapped and wrapped itself around his calf.
I should say "embedded itself" in his calf
Hot chain semi cauterized some of the wound.
I think he wound up with 50 or so stiches and a mean scar.

I'm very respectful of chainsaws. When you see how quickly they can cut through wood, it's not hard to imagine what they can do to flesh. But there are many other hazards associated with tree cutting.
The trees themselves are another unappreciated danger for many. Dead limbs up high, out of sight, tension in a tree that has fallen and can snap suddenly when you are cutting, any breeze that can redirect a tree you think you have perfectly aimed, are all dangerous if not carefully considered.
Look up most dangerous jobs and see what's at the top of the list for good reason.

A friend and his dad were cutting trees down. Dad stayed too close to the stump and they evidently weren't using a hinge or didn't leave enough hinge - when tree fell, the bottom end came loose from the stump and moved laterally really fast and crushed dads chest and internal organs. He died.