Mangled Hand

I am typing this very slowly as I recently dropped a full 6 gal carboy on my hand of what shall now be reffered to as "busted hand" IPA. the resulting drop broke both my middle and ring finger, the ring finger was completely crushed due to the ring i was wearing, and several of my other fingers got baddly cut due to the glass. I received many stiches in my pinky finger, the doctor said the nerve is severed and i will likely never have feeling in most of it for the rest of my life. Story put short, i was honnestly more pissed off at the 6 gallons of delicious beer i just lost, at least i was making a 12 gallon batch and still have the other carboy... Anyway, I was just curious if anyone had any similar stories of manglement, anything worse? Also anyone know any good brewing related activities to spend my month recovering on (that i can do one handed)

There are plenty of horror stories and severe injuries from mishandled glass carboys. I'm sorry for your injury and hope you recover well. Might want to consider Better Bottles going forward but that can sometimes be a touchy subject.

Ouch!!! That had to hurt. Sorry for your loss. Please consider switching to buckets. They are much easier to handle with the built in handle making the possibility of injury much less.

Sorry to hear about your injury and the loss of the beer. Hopefully you do recover full use of the hand despite the poor outlook with the pinky nerve. There is a thread floating around called carboy horror stories compendium. I for one am terrified of glass carboys and won't go near them.

Post pics.

AP

APendejo said:

Post pics.

AP

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I second this.

Stories like this make me glad i only have one glass carboy that I dont use very often. There are definitely better options out there nowadays.

Damn that sucks. They should make the carboys out of pyrex

Sorry to hear about your injury. How did the carboy drop on your hand? Were you carrying. Did it fall from a table/shelf?

Thanks for all the kind words, I will most definately consider making the switch to something less dangerous, my concern with plastic, though, is the increased potential for contamination (in retrospect that doesn't seem so bad). Unfortunately I did not think to take pictures of my hand during the incident, and it is currently in a splint and all bandaged up, nothing really interesting to see. I did snap a pic of the ring my brother managed to find the next day.

This is so terrible!! And i'm very sorry it happened to you. Makes me think i only use glass carboys. I have yet to break one thank the good Lord. This story will for sure remind me to be extra careful when handling glass carboys. I truly hope you recover well my fellow brewing brother. Best wishes to you!!!

it fell on my hand because I was carying it up some stairs and foolishly I had been holding it with both hands underneath. My foot got snagged and rather than falling down the stairs I fell up. Since i was near the top, my hand got crushed between the bottom rounded corner part of the carboy and the top stair, which incidentally is made of concrete. the bottle the toppled and smashed, the single most heart breaking moment in my homebrewing career. Am still very excited for the other carboy full that was salvaged though

Ouch! I know that's gotta hurt.

Everyone else, put that glass carboy in a milk crate today!

Every so often I think maybe I should get a glass carboy or two. Then I see one of these threads and stick with my buckets.

DoctaOcta said:

it Am still very excited for the other carboy full that was salvaged though

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Best part of the whole story right there

Personally I switched everything to Better Bottles. I still have a glass carboy primary and secondary but might use these to keep coins in--save for retirement. Just kidding. I still use them occasionally, but find I really prefer BB for several reasons--weight being only one.

DoctaOcta said:

it fell on my hand because I was carying it up some stairs and foolishly I had been holding it with both hands underneath. My foot got snagged and rather than falling down the stairs I fell up. Since i was near the top, my hand got crushed between the bottom rounded corner part of the carboy and the top stair, which incidentally is made of concrete. the bottle the toppled and smashed, the single most heart breaking moment in my homebrewing career. Am still very excited for the other carboy full that was salvaged though

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Yikes! I hope somebody else cleaned up all the spilt beer for you

I came here after I read the thread on buckets releasing estrogen. What a hazardous hobby haha. I hope you heal up fast. Sorry for your pain and loss, but you will be able to nurse yourself back with the salvaged batch!

GarageDweller said:

I came here after I read the thread on buckets releasing estrogen. What a hazardous hobby haha. I hope you heal up fast. Sorry for your pain and loss, but you will be able to nurse yourself back with the salvaged batch!

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Remember, with great risk comes great rewards...Beer!

You're a freaking trooper. Not only did you crush your finger, sever a nerve, and a bunch of other stuff I shudder to think about...but you still managed to get on HBT and not just type your story, but reply about it. Beers to you

Wow, sorry to hear about this. Ouch. Looks like that ring might take some work to get it back on your finger (which is getting some work of it's own)

DoctaOcta said:

Anyway, I was just curious if anyone had any similar stories of manglement, anything worse?

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You're not the first to break a carboy and get injured.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f11/broken-glass-carboy-horror-stories-compendium-376523/

The first glass carboy I ever handled broke when I was washing it out. The bottom fell out of it, then kinda in slow motion as I was holding it by the neck the rest of it began to fall apart. It cut my leg about 8 inches but not deep at all. I'll never use another one. Buckets and Better Bottles are fine with me.

I'm lucky - the only one I've broken is a 1-gallon jug I was using to step up sour bugs from a bottle I'd had. This was second or third step, so I had probably a third to half a gallon in there. Was bringing to the sink when my hand slipped and down it went. Fortunately I was wearing jeans and boots, so no injury, except my pride. Best smelling mess I ever made.
I generally use buckets for primary fermentation, I do have a couple better bottles I've used a couple times, but the buckets are more convenient, especially for cleaning. I do have a few glass carboys, I just use them for bulk aging, which I do once or twice a year. They live in milk crates, strapped in so they (hopefully, knock on wood) won't go anywhere. Whenever I handle them I use gloves, the sort that are non-slip even when wet. I've seen enough of the horror stories to take as many precautions as I can.

Speedy recovery! Go stainless!

That blows. Glad to hear the injury wasn't worse. It's amazing how heavy 54 lbs of liquid is, plus the vessel, and with it sloshing once it goes it is hard to stop. Even with my stainless fermenter which is slightly lighter than my old glass carboys I struggle to get it over to my garage from the patio, and I don't have stairs.

one of the the reasons I use my allinonewinepump.com pump. No more lifting carboys.

I have one glass carboy (7.5g) that is currently in use fermenting my Brown Something. It lives permanently in a sturdy milk crate, with a carboy handle, unless it's getting cleaned and I am super careful with it. No stairs in our house otherwise klutzy me would have tripped over something a long time ago. Hope your hand is better soon.

The original post was made close to 6 years ago. I think any recovery from the injury that was going to happen has been done for quite some time.

OP's last activity was 2 days after the first post, guess we'll never know

Ugh, fell for a necro thread. I really have to start paying attention to post dates.

Hey, at least that means folks are using searches!

And the necro post didn't even have an injury!

I use buckets and Better Bottles except for my one 1 gallon jug and my 2L starter flask. I even age in my Better Bottles. Up to 10 months - house fix up for sale and procrastination. I'm sure that one was not as good as it should have been, but it was still pretty good.

If I ever use glass carboys for sours or something, they will be in crates and NEVER moved.... Even for cleaning. So I would need to make a way to clean in place.

mullet6577 said:

The original post was made close to 6 years ago.

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No offense to anyone intended.... but I will say I still cannot understand why some search and find an ancient thread and post in it instead of just starting a new thread or adding to a long term still active thread (like the broken glass compendium thread). At the very least, reviving a necro-thread should be prefaced with "I know this thread is 6 years old but...."


Rev.

Rev2010 said:

No offense to anyone intended.... but I will say I still cannot understand why some search and find an ancient thread and post in it instead of just starting a new thread or adding to a long term still active thread (like the broken glass compendium thread). At the very least, reviving a necro-thread should be prefaced with "I know this thread is 6 years old but...."


Rev.

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So this is half-necro-ing the necro'd post...(maybe it's just in a coma... or mostly dead, which is still partly alive.)
I get a selection of posts at the bottom of the page - usually 8 links, 5 of them threads and 3 ads. Most times they're active, but sometimes they're necro from who knows how long ago. Don't know how or why the system chooses those to put out there.
Anyways, I normally do check dates, but must have missed this one to revive.

Wishing you a speedy and full as possible recovery! (even a numb pinky I better than no pinky, I suppose) I have one 3 gallon glass carboy and when I need to move it full I wear those blue finger and palm rubber work gloves. I only use it when I need a secondary so not often. Milkcrate is a good way to keep the bottom from getting chipped. Take care and treat yourself to a new safer fermenter, so there will be no more broken body part beers.

jrgtr42 said:

I get a selection of posts at the bottom of the page - usually 8 links, 5 of them threads and 3 ads. Most times they're active, but sometimes they're necro from who knows how long ago. Don't know how or why the system chooses those to put out there.

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I wasn't even aware of that. Would explain a lot of it. I'd always thought it was people just using the search function then adding to a thread that hasn't been posted in for several years. But yeah a suggested thread feed would definitely explain most of it.


Rev.

@jrgtr42 has a good point. At the bottom of this thread, the mixture of ads and threads has a thread from 2009 whose last post is from 2012. it is "related" and I probably would haven't checked the date on it myself.



It's Dangers of Homebrewing:

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/forum/threads/dangers-of-homebrewing.124653/

That is why I use the New Posts tab at the top. You won't be the first to reply to a necro thread.

kh54s10 said:

That is why I use the New Posts tab at the top. You won't be the first to reply to a necro thread.

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Nope, but I'll be the third!