Nick Perry was 19, just out of high school and working in a lumber yard. This job would earn him some money for a while, and then he’d go back to school.
That is, until he was paralyzed when 42 sheets of plywood fell on him.
“I felt the sheets snap my back,” Perry, now 27, said. “I could feel it go into my back until I couldn’t feel my legs.”
Later, the bad news came from the doctors: You’ll never walk again.
“If this is the way I’m going to spend the rest of my life, that’s when you start debating whether it’s worth it or not,” Perry said.
Looking back, Perry said he didn’t have proper training for the job he was doing.
“All the training I got was basically just passed down: ‘We’re going to start you off here, you’re going to move the material around the yard, then clean up.’”
The lack of proper training made Perry unaware that, when he stopped a forklift with a load of plywood on its tines, a slight shift in the 2,600-pound pile of wood meant it was a timebomb ready to do its destruction on anyone near.
Today, Perry is able to walk as an “incomplete paraplegic,” but his life is not back to normal.
“All that independence that you worked so hard to gain can be taken away from you in a snap of your fingers,” he said. “Know your rights at work, because you can get hurt. Just look at what happened to me.”
Sadly, Perry’s story is not an isolated one. Teen workers are injured on the job twice as often as adults – some of them becoming seriously disabled and even killed. That’s because teens are new to the workplace, they don’t have the years of experience of older workers, they may have supervisors who don’t focus enough on safety, and they’re hesitant to speak up on their first job and demand proper training.
Perry’s injury occurred at a lumberyard in Victoria, B.C., but he’s visiting schools in Washington over the next few weeks, sponsored by the Department of Labor & Industries, to tell his story and warn young people about workplace dangers they face.
Perry preaches that teens need to be aware of workplace safety, to follow the rules, to know what kind of work is legally off limits to them in Washington, and to speak up when necessary and insist on proper training.
More information about special protections to keep teens under 18 safe at work is available at www.teenworkers.lni.wa.gov.
Perry’s workplace injuries changed his life in so many ways – big and small.
“I’d love to be able to dance now, and I can’t dance,” he said. “So it’s those things I took for granted and I didn’t do before my accident, and I can’t do them now. I hate it.”
Steve Cant is assistant director of the Division of Occupational Safety and Health at the Washington State Department of Labor & Industries in Tumwater.
JOIN THE DISCUSSION | Register here
We welcome comments. Please keep them civil, short and to the point. ALL CAPS, spam, obscene, profane, abusive and off topic comments will be deleted. Repeat offenders will be blocked. Thanks for taking part — and abiding by these simple rules. A thorough explanation of rules of conduct can be found in our Terms of Service. If you have any questions, including why your comment may not be showing immediately after you submit it, be sure to visit the commenting FAQ.