Doesn't look like the mishap section has had much love lately, so I'll share the story of the biggest Equipment mishap I've ever had. Warning, this probably won't be a short story...
Going back a couple of decades ago, I was working as a grounds keeper at a large nursing home complex. With several acres of lawns to keep in check, the grounds staff were quite excited about their latest acquisition. A brand new ride on mower that they had been campaigning to get for a couple of years.
So along comes me, probably 30 years younger than the rest of the guys on staff. I'd been employed to clear out some 3 and 4 story high gutters and had been kept on after that was done. It's safe to say that they were reluctant to let the youngster play with the new toy, but over some weeks I gradually earned their trust.
And so it was that I found myself one afternoon finishing up mowing the rather challenging lawn at the front of the complex. The key feature was just how steep it was. From the top of the hill you looked down upon half a dozen grassy terraces with a steep grassy transition between each. To a hedge some 70 meters away at the top of a 4 meter high rock retaining wall at the bottom of the hill.
To mow it I would load the push mower into a little trailer, hook that to the rideon and head out to the top of the hill. unhook the mower and trailer.. Mow the terraces with the rideon, then mow the transitions by hand as they were far too steep for the rider. Having finished that and looking forward to packing up for the day, I pushed the hand mower back to the top of the hill. Wedged it against a hedge. Fired up the ride on, moved it forward. Put it in neutral, Put the foot actuated park brake on.. and dismounted to hook up the trailer.
In my haste, I nudged the handlebar for the push mower, and turned it just enough to dislodge it from where I had wedged it. So I hastily shoved the trailer hitch into the turf and literally dived for the mower as it began to roll away.. And there I was, with a face full of turf sprawled down this hill with one hand on the mower, and I hear this loud "CLANG"
That was the clang of the rideon's park brake slipping off.. Goodness knows why it did it, probably the vibration of the machine running. I scrambled to my feet, but it was way too late. I stood horrified and watched this brand new shiny red machine roll ever so slowly over the lip of the first transition before plummeting down the hill, gathering a boost of speed every time it hit another terrace transition. The push mower slipped from my hand and took off in the other direction. But I didn't care.. My eyes were fixed on this machine that cost 5 times what the car I was driving was worth, now doing about 60kph and nearing the bottom of the hill.
I wondered for a split second if the hedge would stop it.. All it did was give it the lift it needed to clear the lip of the rock retaining wall.. And the machine took to the sky like a bird. Now, fully in shock. I watched it sail majestically in slow motion through the air in a graceful arc. It cleared the whole driveway to the complex before diving headfirst to the garden below where it bounced. Went back up, did a front flip and came down hard on the back before slapping hard into the ground bending all 4 wheels up on crazy angles.
When the dust cleared, not one single piece of the machine was straight. I don't know how long I stood and stared. I remember feeling absolutely certain that I had done nothing wrong. Yet knowing all the while that I would ultimately be held responsible. I Was finished up that afternoon, I didn't even argue it.
The worst bit is, they never wrote it off. I assumed it was completely cactus, but for some reason they hammered and cut and welded it roughly back into shape and kept it. And those poor old guys wound up with a shiny, crinkled dog of a thing with half a steering wheel, that never drove in a straight line again. They never even got a new seat for it, they just bent it back roughly to shape with a big crease in the metal at the small of the back.
