I think I'm lucky that I spent some time working in a chemical factory with lots of OSHA oversight (and lots of need for safety awareness).
I didn't "lock out" my mower's power cord, but I did check more than once before putting my hands in the blade's path. And I question the wisdom of my plan for making a chipper with a 30" wide opening that I would have to hover over, to use. A 55 gallon plastic trash can might not be rigid enough to keep me from diving into it after tripping.
My favorite safety story came from a co-worker who felt "a tingle" while moving an electrically-powered hoist-and-dumper. It would lift a 200 pound barrel up from floor level and pour it into a hopper whose rim was about chest high. It had a lot of power. I think it ran off 220 V.
We wore heavy rubber gloves for chemical protection, so any "tingle" that got through that was a Big Deal.
He held up production to call in an electrician who was bored by silly operators who imagined things wrong in HIS area. He waved a volt meter around dismissively and pooh-poohed this operator's imagination. The operator kept pointing to where he felt the tingle even through his gloves, and the electrician kept mocking him.
Finally the bare-handed electrician told the operator he HAD to be wrong, and "I'll SHOW you!". The electrician grabbed the indicated spots with his bare hands ...
.. and arched his back and gritted his teeth and clamped his hands tight from the shock. He would have cooked in place if the other operators hadn't PRIED him loose from the short circuit with a wooden broom handle.
It didn't stop his heart (surprisingly!), but management made the smartest decision of the year and re-assigned him to putting ink into chart recorders. They also replaced the electrical dumper with an air-powered version.
"I TOLD you I felt a tingle!"
