Worst accident with a traditional?

This might be a good thread to tell my story. As a kid I found a good opportunity to check out one of my dads knives (could have been granddads). It was a one blade slipjoint known here (dutch) as a cable knife. It has a half moon shape unsharpened just before the blade. Presumably to strip cable.

I can't remember what I was doing but it must have been dumb because it bit in the thumb, deep and hard. Probably the worst time I've ever done it. Ofcourse as a kid you lie about how it happened and the aftermath I can't remember. Fast forward to mid teens where I discover I have a magnetic thumb.. Parents wouldn't believe me until I had found a sufficiently strong and light magnet to hang off my thumb.

X-rays then confirmed I had a small slither of steel in the top of my thumb. It's fully encapsulated by white blood thingies and so it could stay. I can't be 100 percent sure about if the two events are related but in my mind they are.
 
I've had a few band-aid level nicks and cuts in the past few years since I got into pocket knives as a hobby. Usually during sharpening and polishing a new knife. Never from just normal use.

Once as a kid, I guess I must have been 11 or so, which would be a little over 45 years ago, I was using my first ever pocket knife, a red Swiss Army knife, doing something related to building model rockets, which was a hobby of mine at the time. Probably something to do with trimming up the balsa wood or cardboard tubes used in their construction. Usually I used an X-acto knife but I guess the SAK seemed like the right tool.

Anyway, that SAK was very sharp. I don't recall exactly what I was trying to cut but the knife slipped or just went right through whatever it was and into the base of my left thumb. I remember it bled a lot and I used a trick my mother had shown me of putting it in a bowl of ice and water. That plus some paper towels and band aids was the extent of the treatment. I don't think I even told my parents about it. I still have a nice scar on my hand there to remind me of it. Learned a valuable lesson about knife use that day from the strictest teacher ever - Professor Experience.
 
I was oiling my Single Shot once and too much oil got on the blade. When I went to close it by pinching the blades down my fingers slipped and it was so sharp it sliced to the bone without me feeling it. I closed it and didn't know I was cut till I felt blood running down my wrist. I was about to leave to visit my girlfriend at her college, so I had to get stitches on the way. Turned out alright though.

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Healed up fine, probably due to the extreme cleanness of the cut.
 
jc57 said:
I've had a few band-aid level nicks and cuts in the past few years since I got into pocket knives as a hobby. Usually during sharpening and polishing a new knife. Never from just normal use.

Once as a kid, I guess I must have been 11 or so, which would be a little over 45 years ago, I was using my first ever pocket knife, a red Swiss Army knife, doing something related to building model rockets, which was a hobby of mine at the time. Probably something to do with trimming up the balsa wood or cardboard tubes used in their construction. Usually I used an X-acto knife but I guess the SAK seemed like the right tool.

Anyway, that SAK was very sharp. I don't recall exactly what I was trying to cut but the knife slipped or just went right through whatever it was and into the base of my left thumb. I remember it bled a lot and I used a trick my mother had shown me of putting it in a bowl of ice and water. That plus some paper towels and band aids was the extent of the treatment. I don't think I even told my parents about it. I still have a nice scar on my hand there to remind me of it. Learned a valuable lesson about knife use that day from the strictest teacher ever - Professor Experience.
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SAKs are always deceivingly sharp to me for some reason. ever since the incident with the pocket pal, i stayed away from traditionals for awhile. that was around hs. i had a camo tinker, and i believe a brand new camper that i kept in its box and sheath. heck even the sak classic on my going out keys is still extremely sharp and I barely use that tiny blade
 
No doubt about the sharpness of SAKs. Apparently it is a long tradition with them, since that would have been around 1969 or so and I assure you I knew nothing about knife sharpening at age 11. As I recall it, I didn't really feel it when it went in, just remember the visual and the bleeding.

Amazing how the idea that a boy could cut himself with a knife and it not be a big deal for anyone, including the kid, seems foreign to us today. Nobody took the knife away or discussed that I shouldn't have had it, and I continued to use it in a safer manner.
 
that and sometimes the accidents brought on by the carelessness. cue the mikov dagger spring incident, i now have a scar on my index finger for my stupidity
 
Saw a guy stick a knife in his leg once, he wasn't as lucky as Joe's B-I-L. We (the local VFD) were clearing some wreckage around a couple of boats that had collided, trying to get one of the passengers clear so we could get him in the bus and off to the hospital. Water was 10-12 feet deep, so we were swimming/floating/hanging off the side of one of the boats. Guy went to cut some rope, the knife pulled through the rope and he slipped, sticking the knife in his thigh.

Blood was suddenly everywhere. We got him to the hospital, but it was a close thing.
 
Much like Derrick, I used too much pressure cutting some light ply parts for a model airplane. Ironically, I was actually using a lockback...however, the lock wasn't as secure as I would've thought, and the web of my hand must've put a hair of pressure to disengage. The knife folded right through the first knuckle on my index finger into my middle finger. I recovered well, but if I'd cut another 1/4 inch the finger would've been wholly removed. Good times...and lots of peroxide to clean up my house!
 
J_Curd said:
Much like Derrick, I used too much pressure cutting some light ply parts for a model airplane. Ironically, I was actually using a lockback...however, the lock wasn't as secure as I would've thought, and the web of my hand must've put a hair of pressure to disengage. The knife folded right through the first knuckle on my index finger into my middle finger. I recovered well, but if I'd cut another 1/4 inch the finger would've been wholly removed. Good times...and lots of peroxide to clean up my house!
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It didn't happen to me, but I witnessed the immediate aftermath of an accident like yours. It was with a Buck 110, if that's traditional enough for this post. A kid in the sheet shop where I worked was using a Buck 110 in a v try unsafe hammer, using the point to push through some plastic sheet material that needed to be cut and shaped. He was told to knock it off and get a proper tool, but his smart comment was "It's a Buck knife, it'll take it."

About an hour after lunch, his trusty Buck knife folded over on him when the lock let go, and he amputated his right index finger at the second joint, and almost took off the middle finger. Blood everywhere. First aid kit used while EMT's war called, and the forman ran upstairs for a cup of ice from the cafeteria to put the finger in. He was transported to Johns Hopkins in Baltimore where they had a hand trauma clinic. Finger was reattached and he recovered, but was fired after for failing to heed the orders of the shop foreman who told him to not use a knife for what he was doing.

It happened in the blink of an eye when the lock failed. I've never trusted a locking blade knife after seeing that.
 
My first knife was a black Victorinox Classic. I saved and saved until I had the twenty dollars it tool to buy it. Every stick in the neighbourhood was turned into a spear, a bow or an arrow. I was trying to drill through a piece of wood with it one day and it closed, slicing the pad near off the tip of my finger. I remember that was the most I had ever bled in my short life. I must have been 7 years old. I was cared my knife was going to get taken away but instead mt dad ensured I knew what I did wrong and reminded me again how to cut safely.

My other time I was rummaging through the knife bin at our local thrift store. They have a big Rubbermaid bin of mostly kitchen knives and you come across a gem every once in a while. My caref digging proved time consuming so I decided to my a little more careless and start taking out knives handfuls at a time. These are mostly extremely dull, as seen on TV, Walmart clearance kitchen knives so in my haste, I cut myself quite badly on the single sharp knife in the box.

I did find a Henckels carving knife in there though. 75 cents and it was mine. I would almost say the cut was worth it...
 
Strangely, I've only had minor nicks from traditionals. But, I've got a few really good scars from non-traditionals. I guess the looks gave me a sense of over confidence that lead to a bloody result. I guess I tend to be more careful with traditionals as 1. they typically don't lock and if I'm not careful it will fold up on me. 2. I treat traditionals as something special, something with a character and soul that should be admired and respected. I just see them differently than non-traditionals as I'm sure the rest of you do.

Now watch me end up making a mess of myself this weekend with a Barlow.
 
Around the age of 9 I became curious as to what it was inside a battery that made it work. I pulled my trusty slip joint knife out of my pocket, set the battery on my bed and began my dissection of the battery. I never did see what was inside that battery but I did get to see what the inside my finger. :D Like John (jc57) said, nobody freaked out and nobody took my knife away but they did tell me what I did was stupid....but I had already figured that part out. :p
 
I tell this tale with great chagrin; consider it a confession of sorts. The worst knife accident for me was not a wound inflicted on myself but rather to a friend. This was back in high school. We were sitting at a kitchen table, and we had, uh, been indulging. That's not an excuse but rather just the circumstances.

Well, there was an 8 or 10-in. carving knife on the table. I had the knife in my hand and one of my buds playfully reached for it and grabbed the blade, which was not a real good idea in the first place. He had a pretty good grip on it. My knee-jerk (emphasis on the jerk part) reaction was to pull the knife away. His palm was sliced open quite deep. It bled profusely. I don't remember him going for stitches, but he probably could have used a few. Thank God, there was no lasting damage to his hand.

It was probably the worst injury I've ever inflicted on another person in my life, and to this day I feel bad about it. I still shudder inside when I think about it.
 
A common theme here seems to be careless or drunk. I've been guilty of both. My most serious cuts seem to come from closing modern liner locks.
It has been awhile since my last bobo so I'm due. I better stay sober and careful.
 
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My dad bought me my first hunting knife, a Case fixed blade that I lost and can't remember the name of, and we were sitting in the truck. I of course had it out smiling and excited. My dad just climbed in and I said, "This doesn't look sharp enough." Before he could say stop I ran my thumb down the edge and it was my first slow motion experience. Blood just gushed out. To the ER we went.

The 2nd was when I trying to impress my sister with my stick sharpening skills. I had my wrist to high and sliced a chunk out my arm. Left a good life long scar.

But, by far my worst mistake was taking a fishing knife to a week long football three a day trip my freshman year. I don't know why I thought we would have time to fish. We just got there and my friend grabbed it. He started to do the Pyscho movie jab with it, freaking me out. As soon as he stopped I returned the gesture and he freaked out grabbing the blade. Near sliced all 4 of his fingers off. He had to have emergency surgery to keep them on. He still has severe nerve damage in three of those. He got out of 3 a days though.
 
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My paternal grandparents lived in a very small house, a slum really. There was a small cramped kitchen, which also served as the bathroom, for washing and and bathing in once a week, when the tin bath was brought in from its hook on the wall outside, and a living room, which was not a great deal bigger. Two armchairs, a sofa, and a sideboard (a low dresser) took up most of the space, and in the corner was a table, which I only ever saw my grandmother use to cool bread. Among the treasures underneath the table lived two bayonets, which my great grandfather had brought back from WW1, one French, one Belgian. Why they were kept there I have no idea, other than that there was nowhere else to put them.

After going to see Errol Flynn and Basil Rathbone in Robin Hood at the cinema during WW2, my father and his younger brother set about imitating the final sword fight with the two bayonets. As a consequence, my Uncle Alec carried a scar on his hand for the rest of his life.

The bayonets were still kept under the table during my own childhood, along with a Khukri, which my Uncle Alec brought me back from his time in the Navy.
 
Well, there's always the time where I was trying to get some oil into the joint of my 99 Talon by opening and closing it after a sharpening session, and the blade snapped down on my right pointer finger. No amputation, but there was some medical grade super glue involved. The doctor was bemused that I collected knives and said something dumb like, "Maybe you won't make your knives so sharp next time, eh?"
"They're safer when they're sharp." I probably muttered under my breath.
Ah well.
 
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