[Closed] Moments when you've had a lucky escape from your own stupidity.

I had the guard off of a circular saw bench last week. I was not concentrating and nail brushed the tips, I felt a buzz and quickly pulled away. I now have a grove on one of my nails but thankfully I still have 10 fingers!

25 miles into a 30 mile road ride today, that included a descent that touched 40, while taking a minute to sit in the sun I noticed I'd completely forgotten to put the bolt that holds the non-driveside crank onto the square taper nibbin back in while cleaning and greasing last week. Somehow it managed not to fall off Cue a very gingerly pedalled last 5 miles..
Any other tales of close calls due to your own idiocy?

Why had you removed it? How did you install it if you had taken crank off?

10 fingers, +2 thumbs?
Somerset? 😀

uselesshippy - Member
10 fingers, +2 thumbs?
Somerset?

Yeah it why I'm so cearly, I know I've got some spare!

Sloshed a bike chain in a petrol filled bowl to clean it, forgetting about the paraffin heater at the end of the garage. Even though I was outside the flame still got me! Got away with burnt hands and no eyebrows.

When to change the blade on my circular saw whilst (I have no idea why) resting he blade on the jumper I was wearing, and without unplugging it. I accidentally started the saw and by a miracle of luck the thick jumper jammed the blade and stalled the motor.

Re-wiring house, cut wrong lighting circuit in loft, the live one! Installation on cutters grips saved me.

All in my younger days I'm happy to say.

I drilled through a live cable while putting some shelves up in my old house. Came round sitting in the dark (it had blown the power completely) over the other side of the kitchen. Where the drill hole was there was now about an inch diameter hole, but oddly, no fragments of brick or plaster to be found, must have been atomised! And the drill bit had a sublimated copper tip.

[Minor compared to any bit of DIY WCA has ever attempted though........]

Using a router to enlarge cavity on an old bass to fit new gubbins. Hooded sweatshirt. When I'd nearly finished i noticed the draw strings from the hood were dangling in the cavity right near the bit spinning merrily away.

Worst one (and still makes me feel sick thinking about it) was on holiday in LA, staying with family friends. I was 14/15, they had guns. Was playing (yep - dick move straight away) with an old colt navy revolver they had on display, cocked it but couldn't release the hammer. So pointed it at my sister and pulled the trigger. It took 0.000000001 seconds for the realisation that it could have actually been loaded to hit me. Urgh.

25 miles into a 30 mile road ride today, that included a descent that touched 40, while taking a minute to sit in the sun I noticed I'd completely forgotten to put the bolt that holds the non-driveside crank onto the square taper nibbin back in while cleaning and greasing last week. Somehow it managed not to fall off Cue a very gingerly pedalled last 5 miles..
Any other tales of close calls due to your own idiocy?

Why had you removed it? How did you install it if you had taken crank off?

The crank wasn't actually removed when cleaning, I just took the bolt out to de-grit the treads and clean it as it was a little loose and completely forgot to put it back on. It's now time to hunt through the spare bits box to try and find it. 🙄

Cutting wood with circular saw and now ppe. Felt something in eye, looked in mirror to see a large wood chip pocking out. So very very close to pupil.

Nearly got married once

On a trail today came across an unexpected 5 foot drop off after a steep roller. The landing was on on to an upward sloped transition.

Actually I didn't get away with that - bloody hell I'm sore!

Almost did the 'finger in brake rotor and spin the wheel' special the other day while fettling in the garage! Luckily pulled it out quickly enough to just brush the tip of my finger... Doh!

Mentioned this here before, almost blew myself up... Working on the motorbike and booted a plastic can of petrol out of the way- right in front of my electric fan heater. Noticed a high-pitched keening noise a few minutes later and discovered the can had gone soft and the petrol and gas expansion had blown it up like a balloon. Pretty sure it wasn't far from splitting, and then hot petrol and a load of pressurised petrol fumes would have burst out at the ceramic heater... Lucky one.

on the road bike cycling along quite happily doing about 20 down a little hill when i noticed one of the bar caps had popped out a little. obviously i decided to bash it back in. i just managed to control the wobble without falling off.

I was following a mate up a route when I relalised I wasn't tied in properly (at all) managed to retie the rope 1 handed and reverse to the floor.
[img] [/img]
I was there

Another climbing one, end of a very long day on El Cap, we decided we needed to ab off the route as I had a bus to catch that evening. Set belay device up on the tail of the joined ropes...

Said yes to the father in law when he suggested sitting in the bucket of the tractor with a chainsaw to clear some trees while driving down the river bed. Few others on that theme too!

As a pissed up student back in 1989 I dropped a jumper on an electric fire and fell asleep. Woke up with a room full of smoke. Luckily the jumper charred/melted. If it had caught fire I would have killed myself and 4 mates.

Still have the odd nightmare about that one.

As a pissed up student back in 1989 I dropped a jumper on an electric fire and fell asleep. Woke up with a room full of smoke. Luckily the jumper charred/melted. If it had caught fire I would have killed myself and 4 mates.
Still have the odd nightmare about that one.

First or 2nd year?

Worked in a cafe, the large aerosol of oil for the egg fryer got knocked off the side and bounced across the open chip fryer and landed in the second one. Luckily the basket was still in the second fryer so I could get it out. Cafe was opposite a bank of about 30 Tesco checkouts and I don't think 20 litres of chip oil being detonated across the money making end of the supermarket would have gone down too well... 😯

Early twenties, following two mates on our motorbikes.(here we go 🙄 )
A45 near Coventry, dual carriageway. The two lanes were closing to one in roadworks, mates were ahead, I decided to go for it too.
The lanes were narrowing, I passed one, two, three cars, came alongside the last car as the lane was about 1.5 lanes wide, and this car inexplicably veered over towards me. Left me nowhere to go.

I was doing probably 80mph, and my right hand clipped a sandbagged roadsign, I felt an almighty smack to my body. I weaved and pulled over to the side of the road about 100 yards further down, the car carried on, it's driver still oblivious to my presence.

I had massive pain in my right arm, and then I noticed some blood on my hand. Looking down, I had lost my right finger just above the knuckle. I later worked out that the sign had hit my brake lever, the lever had sheared and the sharp end had cut my finger off.

I hadn't noticed it due to the pain of a compound fracture to my right arm. My glove was on the road, with my bit of finger still in it being run over by cars.

All of this was stupid but, the lucky escape part was, that on later inspection of my bike, I had a massive vertical dent in the side of the petrol tank. This means that at 80mph, my front wheel had turned past full sidewards lock and then back again. By rights, I should have been under that line of cars... 😯

I had the guard off of a circular saw bench last week. I was not concentrating and nail brushed the tips, I felt a buzz and quickly pulled away. I now have a grove on one of my nails but thankfully I still have 10 fingers!

Working tired with an Arbourtec

one of these spinning at 10,000 rpm

[img] [/img]

Put the tool down and after switching off the blade keeps spinning sown for a while. Unthinkingly I just decided to grab the blade to stop it, the same way as you'd grab a wheel that you're giving it a test spin. I grabbed it. It stopped. I was fine.

Won't try it again though

First or 2nd year?

2nd - The Yew's Mount shithole house. You were in the room on the other side of the landing.

Sorry.

Keeping tabs on fuel economy,I always zero the milage on the clock whenever I fill up with fuel. Noticing you've forgotten when driving away from the filling station is not a good time to press the zero button on impulse, especially if it involves putting your hand through the wheel whilst negotiating a roundabout. Skid marks (both on the road, and in the undies), 3 point turns, and odd looks from other drivers are still in my memory about 15 yrs later

This was a couple of weeks ago... Refitting the kitchen, I needed to connect the extractor to existing wiring. Turned off the downstairs power and lighting rings (just in case it had been bodged from the lights...). Grabbed the cable to sort and flash/bang...black finger. Turns out it was spurred off the oven power (not turned off). RCD's do work 🙂

There are a few climbing ones, the most memorable being a decent of the Ben after winter climbing. We'd finished our route without incident then stuffed the decent in a white out. 'Missed' number 4 gulley and ended up abbing off a loose peg placed in frozen shale from where we ended up.... Not a navigational finest hour and [i]very[/i] memorable...

Noticing you've forgotten when driving away from the filling station is not a good time to press the zero button on impulse, especially if it involves putting your hand through the wheel whilst negotiating a roundabout.

I've done that. The only casualty (fortunately) was a snapped indicator stem, the force of the straightening wheel using my arm as leverage sheared it clean off.

Climbing one, first climb of the year so not route fit. decide to work out on a 7c+ at Kilnsey. Grunt my way up to about 2/3 height, slap into the big hold before the crux moves. Eventually decide not to go for the final moves and grab the quickdraw, just as the rope (that I had forgot to tie into) falls out of my harness. Potential 50 foot ground fall luckily averted 😯 but I still get flashbacks 20 odd years later.

Riding at Tigne summer before last (with my son 7), went up on the final lift before it closed for lunch. Weather was looking dodgy but seemed like it would be OK for one last run. Que biblical thunder and lightening as soon as we got off the gondola and it stopped. The descent back to the village was pretty intense. It was definitely character forming for my son 😥

Did the finger in the rotor thing quite recently as well, luckily it just took off a layer of skin and a few mm of nail.

Manouvering the angle grinder up under the Landy to grind off a rusty bolt. I was lying underneath it on my back with the blade facing downwards, just above my chest. Because I was wearing gloves I didn't realise my finger was on the trigger and the angle grinder powered up. I juggled and fumbled with it until the disc stopped, ending up with the blade cupped in my hand, well on its way through the glove and beginning to score a nice gouge in my skin. That smarted!

I nearly got struck by lightening once. It hit a car about 2 metres away. I felt the hairs on my neck tingle before it happended.

2nd - The Yew's Mount shithole house. You were in the room on the other side of the landing.

Sorry.

We could have climbed out of the windows onto the roof. Like we used to when we were sunbathing.

😯

The stupid things that we did! Lad I went to school with broke his back after drunkenly falling off a roof whilst trying to steal a Sky dish for a dare.

Used petrol to start a BBQ like this one:

[img] [/img]

I got the fuel air mixture spot on in the 'barrel' under the dish and turned it into an improvised mortar that showered the garden and nearby roofs with charcoal.

when me and my friends were younger, every bonfire night we would make a massive bonfire at the side of a disused factory near to where we lived..every now and then we would play some dumbassed games, one which included throwing an aerosol can into the fire and watching them explode...on one occasion the can never exploded in the fire but shot out and hit a neighbours car...cue another idea...find a cast iron drain pipe in a skip...shove one end into the fire and prop the other end up into the air using some wood....then drop aerosol cans down the pipe into the fire and watch them shoot out across the river onto the busy bypass....luckily no cars were passing when cans were fired out but there were some near misses...
once the fire had started to die down we would then play a bit of fire jumping which involved running at the fire to see if you could clear the fire....was funny when one of my mates set his crotch on fire...

Aged about 9/10, sledging down steepest hill we could find, which was the driveway of nearest big house (think it was actually Russell Johnston's house, in Inverness.

Exit from this was onto the road out of Inverness, not main one luckily but still traffic'ed -- as a sop, we had a mate standing on point duty at bottom of hill, still nearly went under a bus 🙁

Tried to extract burning toast from new ish toaster, with nearest implement - shiny metal bladed and handled kitchen knife, came to on other side of the kitchen..

I caught the tip of my finger in a rotor a few weeks ago. It really bloody hurt and bled like crazy.

I had a lucky escape last night at Cannock, pushing too hard in the failing light on teh second to last descent on the Monkey trail. Not sure what happened but I was riding way too fast on the top bit and got a bit squirrely and nearly went over the bars. Gievn how hard the ground was and the close trees, I think I would have been in a world of pain.

A few years ago, we turned my study into snug which took longer than I though it would. I was shattered after a week of hard graft and was making up an extension lead to reach where the TV / hi fi would be. Wired up the plug, tacked the cord to the wall then worked out the exact length of cable, grabbed the wire cutters cut it and bang. Turned out I'd left the plug in the socket which was switched on. Amazingly I was fine despite teh surprise of the noise. The fuse blew and there was a large chunk of metal missing from the wire cutters.

The stupid things that we did! Lad I went to school with broke his back after drunkenly falling off a roof whilst trying to steal a Sky dish for a dare.

I was sat on my roof in my bare feet last Saturday afternoon sealing up a leaky skylight with a bathroom sealant gun. I did mention it to a few people who looked at me funny.

Hmm.

Was there a crowd of kids shouting "go on white boy, jump!"?

grubbing round in a mates shed looking for something (cant remember what), I dropped a match in a petrol can to see inside, match went out so tried again and pow!, not much skin left on my face, or hair, my eyelashes melted together and couldnt open my eyes until I broke the singed lashes off.
not a good look when youre still at school.

I love walking around on the roof in bare feet - my dad doesn't do heights so I always get called on for any roof-related shenangans.

A friend was found unconscious by his parents on his bathroom floor after a light bulb blew whilst he was in the bath. In the dark, he stood up in water up to his shins and decided he'd just whip the blown bulb out whilst he was there. 🙂

When I was a kid, I was changing a light bulb and my mother turned on the light so I could see what I was doing...

But that's not my own stupidity. My own stupidity: I've set fire to my hair several times while brazing.

And now I have a TIG welder I keep burning myself. With gas, stuff is cold, gets hotter, goes red, then orange, then yellow, then cools down again. I've been doing it for so long, my brain knows that if something has been red hot recently, it's probably still hot.

But with TIG, it doesn't do that - so I keep trying to pick up stuff that I've just welded.

Does it count as me being stupid for joining the TA, I nearly got killed multiple times on the ranges for people accidentally discharging their weapon.

Another climbing one from me. On the third abseil off something in spain and I didn't look as I threaded the ropes and then lent back. Just as I reached balance point I saw that I'd only clipped one of the two ropes. Cue me rocking on my heels and trying not to breathe. Caught my balance, rethreaded the ropes and when I got to the ground I sat under a bush crying.

My older brother was so competitive when we were growing up. Once we went "conkering" and we were hunting round on the ground for fallen conkers as youdo but this wasn't good enough for our kid. He spotted some nice big husks in the tree and found half a house brick to throw up to dislodge them.after two or three attempts he managed it and went rushing up to get them before anyone else.

And before the brick had started on its downward trajectory.

Every time I see him, the scar on his head makes me smile.

Long story short but when drunkenly opening the window on the 22nd floor of the Park Lane Hotel in Hong Kong I managed to fall out of it. As I went out I managed to spread my legs and brace my feet either side of the window frame thus leaving me hanging below the window from the knees up.

Sobered up in about 2 seconds and managed to reach back and drag myself back in.... Whole process felt like it took minutes but really was probably only a couple of seconds.

I'll never forget looking down onto the dual carriageway below looking at the red roofs of the taxis that were really small.

All that due to wanting a crafty smoke in a non smoking room and couldn't be bothered to go downstairs (at least by the traditional method).

😯 😯 😯

This thread jesus

10/10, would wince again.

As a kid there was this huge hill with a ninety degree corner at the bottom. between New Mills and Furness Vale. It was matter of honour to nail it down there flat out and brake at the last minute on a bike.

One day I was doing this and a fairly big lorry came round the corner straddling the white line, I braked too hard, went over and slid under the lorry between the wheels to stop up against the wall on the other side, pretty much completely unharmed.

More recently, and this was incredibly stupid, I decided that lying down on a train track to try and take a picture of the tracks disappearing into the darkness would be a good idea. I did this in a station on the assumption that if anything came the other way on the other track, it'd have to stop so I'd hear it slowing down.

Not all trains stop at the station.

Had a blocked sewer at the nursing home I was maintenance man at, so off I goes with the old(very) JCB 3C to dig up the spot where blockage is occurring. Easy to find you know, cos there is s**t everywhere. Digs a hole as you do, and then wearing my trusty wellies steps in to clear the pipe - at this point you realise the v/old JCB has due to completely worn everything, dug a hole about twice what you intended, which led to wellie failure - AND yes, I am in the s**t again!
Apart from that, I have never done anything stupid in my entire life!

Winter climbing one from me. Climbed up to the top of Jacobs Gully as the first climb of a trip to Scotland, packed everything up and grabbed the map and compass as I get to navigate in semi-white-out conditions. Ice axe in hand I use the map to set the compass bearing and add the magnetic variation so we can walk away from the edge in safety. Still holding the axe I transfer the compass to the same hand and nearly walk off the cornice above Mess of Pottage. Whoever the chap was who shouted at me saved my life that day!

Out riding with a couple of guys from this parish a week or two back. Found this at the side of the trail; none ofus knew exactly what it was so I poked it with a stick. Of course, it's loaded with a shotgun shell.
One guy blown clean off his feet, me not daring to look down at my hand for fear of what might be missing. All of us with ringing ears. In the end I just had a couple of little burns but it really could have been a child's face as it was a ROW.
[img] [/img]
As it turns out it's a mole gun, shown here in tripped position. Bloody farmers....

@samurai know just the hill :-O used to just the same but slide the bike & jump in with the flow of traffic until a mate faceplanted a car giving himself a new nose - monster t's escaped without a scratch though

As it turns out it's a mole gun, shown here in tripped position. Bloody farmers....

Almost abducted by alien.....

Almost abducted by alien.....

That's exactly what they want you to think 🙂

Not sure if illegal or not, we're not in the UK. Good point though, I'll ask a lawyer mate who'll know exactly where to find out if it's legal.

Walking through Cannock Chase with a couple of mates and our girlfriends, decide we going to do a runner from the girls and climb the trees whilst the girls walk around underneath looking for us.

I'm about 30 foot up and as high as I can go, so I get my mate to swing his tree in my direction whilst I do the same, intending to move from one tree to the other Tarzan stylee. Cue one spreadeagled Pocketrocket stuck between two pine trees, no problem thought I, I'll just get both trees swinging and move to the taller one on the forward swing, it worked a treat, right up till the moment the top of the tree snapped off and I start my very fast decent to the ground passing my mate on the way.

The fall seemed to take forever and I had time to think "Sheeet! " then " I'm going to die, I'm falling head first toward the ground and I'm going to snap my neck" then " Where is the ground?".

I came to a few moments later, everybody standing around me whilst I was still gripping the top of the tree in my hands, A foot to the side off me was a cut off tree stump sticking out of the ground.

I walked away with nothing but a few scratches on the back of my neck and arms from falling through the branches and a vow never to do Tarzan impressions again!

When I was about 22 I got a shot of my brothers Susuki GS750 (I don't and never have had a motorbike license) and took it for a spin up the (country) road. After just about failing to make a corner (I was used to trail bikes with high centre of gravity) I decided that I should open it up and let rip...

Managed to hit a dyke at the roadside a glancing blow at 60 mph [i]very fast[/i] and stack it big style writing the bike off in the process. Walked away from it (albeit home to get an ambulance and spend 3-4 days in hospital).

The stupidest thing actually is that I'm seriously thinking about doing a concentrated motorbike test course and getting a bike... 😯

Another really stupid thing I've done was (just for a laugh) I thought I'd spark my lighter up under my mates arm. Except he was wearing an old cotton shirt which proceeded to flash burn off all the tiny little 'hairs'/threads up his arm... Absolutely no harm came to him but I realised just how stupid I'd been. My face must have been a picture!

Another really stupid thing I've done was (just for a laugh) I thought I'd spark my lighter up under my mates arm. Except he was wearing an old cotton shirt which proceeded to flash burn off all the tiny little 'hairs'/threads up his arm... Absolutely no harm came to him but I realised just how stupid I'd been. My face must have been a picture!

Mate had a jumper you could do that to after every wash! Never got old.

I was once feeding a large branch into a big tractor mounted chipping machine and the branch got caught in my clothing and started pulling me in. Luckily I had the presence of mind to push the emergency stop lever before i got minced by the thing. Nearly messed meself.

This thread reminds of that saying:

What is the link between apes and intelligent people?
We are....

moved into new house a few years ago cables plus switch for outside light already there on rear wall by backdoor so got an outside light and started to fit it made sure the switch was off when I got the blanking plate off there were two red live cables and in a blond moment tested which one was still live one with my fingers woke up on the lawn about 5 feet away with wife looking down at me asking why all the electrics had tripped in house.

Tombstonng at Holcombe Quarry *shudder*

Aged about 12 on Whitstable beach. We had just done the 1st world war at school and thought a re-enactment might be a laugh. 2 groups of 4 kids dug some trenches in the stone beech, got in them and lobbed the snowball sized spoil at each other pretty much as hard as we could from about 30yards. It took about 3 minutes for the inevitable to happen. Fortunately for me it was some other mug that got the rock between the eyes but suffice to say his place at the grammar school we all attended was pretty much a waste after that.

Climbed up to the top of Jacobs Gully as the first climb of a trip to Scotland,

2 other Jacobs stories:

Skied it thinking 'I'm skiing like a bag of sh!t'. When I got to the bottom my touring bindings were still in walk mode (or had popped into walk mode).

Ski touring in the same area in a total pea souper on a bearing. 10 steps, check compass, 10 steps check compass. On about the 7th repetition of this as I lifted the compass my eyes focussed on the tips of the skis which were overhanging the cornice by about a foot.

Choice words were spoken.

Back when I first started driving had a nice red Escort Mk1 - progress was either accelerating or braking, nothing in between like you do when you're young. Stuck behind a slower car on a country lane decided that that bank on the right looked smooth enough so overtook with two wheels up the bank... Failed to notice the entrance to a field coming up - bounced down and then back up the other side of the entrance, took off and landed sideways in front of the other car and purely by luck managed to correct it and zoom away feeling like a right numpty.

I remembered another one. Now this wasn't my stupidity but a stupid way to die

I was in one of the 24 hour races, solo. Middle of the night. Right up in the woods, wet. I fell off and fell into a puddle. I stayed clipped in with the bike on top of me, one arm twisted behind me and the other seemingly clagged up in a massive mud puddle.

So I'm lying there, face in a massive puddle, unable to get out and I'm straining to keep my face out of the water. I start to panic and shout for help. People riding past all cheer and wave at the silly man in the puddle.

"Stop pissing about you idiot, get out of the way"

"glug glug"

Realising I was about to start drowning I began pistoning my legs and managed to get one foot out of the clips which was enough for me to start twisting round and finally get out of the mire. I was completely coated in mud from head to toe and as I struggled round people were having a good laugh at me.

Really had far too many to recall but some of my best ones are when I was 15 I'd a old Mk2 Escort that I drove off road.

None of my mates at school believed that I had a car at that age and, instead of taking them to the car, I took the car to them, at school parked up on a car park on the nearby housing estate and took them all to it at lunchtime.

I'd just got my Mountain bike a couple of years ago and I was messing around with he rebound thingy on the front shock whilst pedalling along and for some stupid reason I bounced the front end to see if it made a difference and I grabbed the front brake. Really really hard. OTB moment.

Cleaned my BMX when I was about 8 and took the front wheel off to polish the forks and didn't tighten it back up proper. Face plant onto cobbled back street, 2 front teeth chipped.

Still when i was a kid a Mate of mine decided to see how fast he could go down a railway footbridge on his bike, but it was only that metal chequer plate on the ramp down. He couldn't stop went flying into some bushes which were covering a deep ditch.
This was middle of summer so everything was in full bloom and, although I could hear him and talk to him, it took me 10 mins to actually clear enough shrubbery away so I could get him out.

Bit through a live cable to trim it not realising that the other end of the cable was attached to a plug which was plugged in and switched on. Luckily the house electricity had tripped

Crashed at glentress and getting up I noticed a felled tree next to me with lots of short sharp looking branches sticking out literally inches from my ribs. I snapped every branch off that tree just in case the next person to overshoot the corner wasn't as lucky as me.

Also RCD'S are fantastic!

When I was much younger, I had a bullet belt (15 year goth) and a fascination with gunpowder... I filled a bullet casing from said belt with the contents of a banger, little realising what the consequences would be... And did this in the living room of my parents empty and newly uninsured house (we were moving)

When the gunpowder ignited, an incredibly loud bang was followed by a blinding, fiery flash and pain in my calf. I was incredibly disoriented (temp blind and deaf) and remember thinking "shit....I've set fire to the house".... When I got my wits about me I realised the damage was limited to a huge scorch mark up the wall and part of a shredded bullet casing embedded in my calf muscle (which smarted a touch, let me tell you)... A very lucky escape all in.

I said earlier I had never done anything stoopid! - well I lied. So there I was, 18 yrs old with me new compound bow. Tape one of me brothers shotgun shells to the tip of the arrow (with a ball bearing over the percussion cap) and launch skywards. Ehhhm - what actually happened was that one very unbalanced arrow ( now there's a surprise ) goes horizontal pronto onto the hard standing of the old local aerodrome and goes bang. The brighter among you will have figured out which way the pellets were now heading - that would be everywhere young man cos they are no longer contained within a nice shotgun barrel. Simultaneously I figure this out and get very friendly with the ground. That was one of my nine lives used up as well as a pair of underpants.
There was also the time I was working on a roof in a rainstorm that had migrated from the amazon. The power cables on the end of the house were shorting out and the electrictricity was making its way along the asbestos slates. I found this out when I leaned over from the scaffolding to pass me boss and touched the roof " **** me I says I think the roof is live" - the boss says " I did wonder that myself". Ya ****!!!!!!

Driving a hundred and something miles to the Quantocks on one of those days that police and weather forecasters ask you not to go out under any circumstances, go for a ride, come back to find a four foot diameter tree lying two foot away alongside the car.

Stooging aound on skis on a glacier at the Grands Montets, Argentiere, looking for good snow with my skiing buddy behind me. Didn't realised that glaciers do change shape from year to year and suddenly found myself on blue ice, heading for an ice cliff, unable to get an edge in and stop. Skis went away from under me and as I slid over the edge on my hip, feet first, I remember thinking I needed to keep my legs together for the landing. About 20 feet below I landed in the crevasse, which was choked with snow. Then realised my mate was right behind me so I rolled to one side and a second later he landed where I had been, landing face down and dislocating his shoulder. Cue a swearing session then an "Aaargh" and his shoulder relocated itself and we picked ourselves up and skied back down, much chastened. I think skiing into a crevasse must be one of the most unpleasant ways to die because they are often a thin wedge shape and you slide down and are killed by your own weight compressing your ribcage.

Ooo Globalti, not as serious but very recent..... Skiing in a white out, guy in front disappears but I'm not watching him so think he's just behind a bump. He went over an unseen 20' drop off but stayed in the landing zone faffing. The look on his face when I did exactly the same will stay with me for some time... 80kg of freefall Boblo+very sharp skis must have concentrated his mind....