Tuesday, August 19, 2014

Table Saw Safety!

Good afternoon to all I.D.I. employees:

The table saws that we provide come with a blade guard that is bolted in place.  The blade guard is there for a reason.  The blade guard is there to protect you from the blade so that you don’t cut off a finger or your hand.  It also is there to help keep debris from the materials that you are cutting from flying towards you.  Our Safety Director, Safety Pete, was at a job site recently where he came across one of our table saws that had the blade guard removed.  No one was using the table saw at the time and in fact, we didn’t have any carpenters on site at the time.  On occassion, table saws are returned to the shop with the blade guard removed.   

For your personal safety, you cannot use a table saw with the blade guard removed.  Using a table saw with the blade guard removed is an OSHA violation and a violation of our company’s safety policies.  This unsafe act can lead to serious injuries and high dollar fines.  We don’t want to have to call one of your loved ones to tell them that you cut off your hand because you were using a table saw and you intentionally removed the blade guard.  In addition to the above, table saw users must wear eye protection. 
 
The photo above shows a table saw with the blade guard removed.  This in turn exposes the table saw user to the spinning blade.  Please contact our Safety Director, Peter Graham with any questions.  He can be reached at (847) 417-1689.

Have a Safe Day!