Carpenter in nail gun accident survives being shot in heart

A carpenter from Idaho is recovering after a nail gun accident last week.  The on the job injury occurred when he accidentally activated the trigger to a nail gun he was holding.  The nail ejected, bounced off a ladder, and shot the man in the heart.  Fortunately, no one pulled the nail out and took him to the hospital.  Had the nail been taken out, he would have bled to death.

There are a few points that come to mind regarding this story:

First, because this was a work related injury, he would be eligible to file worker's compensation case.  Worker's compensation benefits in Illinois include medical expenses, two-thirds of your average weekly wage while you are off work, and a lump sum payment for permanency associated with the injury.

Second, one of the well-recognized hazards in the nail gun injury is the possibility of injury due to unintentional triggering of the gun.  Nails are shot out of the gun with great force, which taken with the fact that nails are intended to penetrate, result in very serious injury when someone gets hit by an ejected nail.  Any nail gun that has been manufactured without specific guards against accidental triggering contain a defect in design which can form the basis of a third party liability defective product suit.

Anyone who might consider filing a defective product suit as a result of a workplace accident such as this would do well to follow two recommendations:

1.  Preserve the remains of the product involved.  In this case, the nail gun should be set aside and not used any further or repaired.  Loss of the product or alteration of the product from the condition it was in at the time of the accident can result in dismissal of the a suit against the product manufacturer.

2.  As noted above, this kind of construction accident has the potential for both a worker's  compensation case and a third party liability lawsuit.  The interaction between worker's compensation cases and third party liability suits is quite complex, so we strongly recommend hiring an experienced Chicago personal injury lawyer to assist in cases such as this.