I’ve forgotten a ton of close calls and minor injuries related to vehicles. Three stick in my mind a bit though...
1) Was working on my blue 2000 Ranger when I was off at college. It was a pea gravel driveway and I didn’t think much of it. Had to replace a broken wheel stud in the back. I don’t remember if I had jack stands with me or not, but I had some 6x6, 4x4 and 2x4 in the truck and a bottle jack. I left the wood in the truck since I wasn’t planning on getting under the truck, just jacked it up, pulled the tire and used it for a seat. Everything was going well until I was tightening a nut to pull the stud through and all of a sudden there was a crunching noise, the jack tipped over and the truck dropped to the ground right in front of me. I was more startled than scared since it was unexpected and so fast. I also had a big problem on my hands because now my bottle jack didn’t fit under the axle. Had to dig under the axle to be able to get it back up to get the tire on and I did use blocks to prevent it from happening again. Now anytime I jack something up, I have something handy to support it, as soon as it fits, it goes in.
2) I was replacing body mounts on my choptop. A couple of them had to be cut, so I took the guard off of my 4.5” grinder and put a 6 or 7” disk on. Cut the mounts just fine. During reassembly I discovered that I was in need of a short deep well socket. So I figured I would use the grinder. Actually thought about putting the guard and proper disk back on but figured it would only take a minute to.... zing... my thumb was too close to the unprotected blade, which went right through my mechanic glove and cut a nice slot in my thumb faster than you could think.
3) I was using a grinder WITH the guard, but I was irritated and had some people that I don’t really care for that were refusing to shut up and let me work. Kept ask me things and making useless suggestions when all of a sudden the grinding wheel caught and the grinder (sans side handle) jumped and caught my other thumb, carving a nice wide groove. The two promptly made excuses and left.