What is the worst thing that has happened to you at Work?

[reecejackox]

Or the worst thing you have done at work

I work in a supermarket and while in the warehouse yard while it was icy , I slipped and injured myself.

 

[jaybirdsmommy]

Got to work one morning, had a conversation with a vendor. vendor then left to go work on a piece of equipment. 5 minutes later a maintenance guy comes running around the corner yelling to call an ambulance. vendor had a heart attack and died on the floor.

 

[a1tinkfans]

Got to work one morning, had a conversation with a vendor. vendor then left to go work on a piece of equipment. 5 minutes later a maintenance guy comes running around the corner yelling to call an ambulance. vendor had a heart attack and died on the floor.

Omg how tragic!

Me: finally pregnant after many many procedures and protocols, fell while at at work... and what a fall.
had to be hospitalized and subsequently pain/medical issues forward..

 

[luvmarypoppins]

The worst thing that happened to me at work, which was years ago was that I was talking to the computer repair guy.

A week later he made the headlines. He murdered and dismembered his wife.

 

[Kathryn Merteuil]

Wow those things are awful!

I was just really upset/angry when I dropped my glasses between the counter and the wall today. Somebody pulled on a panel and reached back there and got them for me, so I really shouldn't complain too much.

 

[low-key]

gun pointed at me

 

[nene0182]

I suppose it was when all 200 of us were called into a meeting and told we were losing our job. We never saw it coming and there were people there that had worked there for 30+ years.

My husband fell at work last year and broke his ankle in 3 places. That really messed up our summer.

 

[potterfanatic]

One of my coworkers (many years ago) tried to get me fired from my job by telling my manager that I had HIV. I'm not sure what her plan was there, since I'm pretty sure it would be illegal to fire me just for having HIV. For the record, never had it or even thought I did. So that was a really surprising conversation when the manager told me what had happened.

 

[My2Qtz0205]

Wow! I don’t have anything to compare to these! We need reaction buttons like FB!

A couple of months after Sandy Hook the school I was subbing in went into lockdown. There was a murder down the street and the police were concerned that the perpetrator might try to hide on one of the buses or under a portable unit. We were locked in classrooms with lights off and no noise for 2 hours. Kids were scared to death, and having to pee in buckets in the closet. It was awful, but I am grateful we were safe. I could see police outside our classroom window from a crack in the blinds.

 

[ronandannette]

It's a longer story than can be done justice here but it involves our company being nominated for a hugely prestigious national award; one that we had won the previous year and fully expected to win again. Picture 1,000 of our closest colleagues and competitors seated in a ballroom watching the VP of our company make his way onto the stage...except the winning company that was announced wasn't us.

You could have heard a pin drop and even the presenter was totally thrown. The boss slunk back down to our tables where he turned his chair around with his back to us and didn't speak another word to any of us for the remainder of the evening. It was the singular, most humiliating professional moment of my life. It was 6 years ago but still gets mentioned in our "circles" once in a while. We have gone on to win the same award 4 times since then but we all tremble in our shoes at the ceremony (to which our attendance is mandatory).

 

[Jimmy Mouse]

Back in 1997 I managed a car audio before I opened my own. 3 guys came in with guns pointed. Locked the door, made everyone lay face down including customers. Closed the bay doors and took a lot of merchandise as well as all the cash in the drawer and all our wallets and a ladies purse. They tied us all up and left us tied up. It ended up making the news and the robbers were never caught.

 

[kaytieeldr]

I suppose it was when all 200 of us were called into a meeting and told we were losing our job. We never saw it coming and there were people there that had worked there for 30+ years.

My husband fell at work last year and broke his ankle in 3 places. That really messed up our summer.

Sounds a lot my "worsts"!

Company I worked at 14 years had a meeting with 2/3 of the staff and laid us all off. They kept one manager and one staffer from each department. Mostly relatives.

Broke my leg twice at work. Well, the first time I tripped on a box and probably mildly fractured the bone, but it took about three months and several falls for the actual break. Second incident, different company, I spilled some water and slipped in it when I went to get paper towels to wipe up the spill.

 

[aprilchem]

A student treated to kill me in writing about 15 years ago at my job (I'm a college professor).

A year ago another student got in my face after class and threatened to kill me, said she was going to get me fired, etc. She was screaming and yelling and there wasn't really anyone around on my floor to help. It ended up being ok but I was super nervous for a while because I thought she might come back and make good on her threat.

 

[Gumbo4x4]

Got canned

As for physical, it's a tie between falling off a ladder head first onto a pallet jack or the broken tension cable causing the overhead truck door to come down on me like a guillotine.

 

[jevs]

I used to work with adults transitioning out of mental institutions and into mainstream. One day one of the men we were working with attacked a female co-worker, myself, and another client while we were out in public. Unsure if that was the worst or the fact I had to work with the guy the following day, we weren’t offered debriefing until 2 weeks later, or the fact that other staff members dismissed the event.

About a month or so later the same guy attacked another staff member onsite. It took three co-workers to restrain him, two of them male. Interestingly, there was debriefing immediately.

I kind of lost respect for that workplace after that.

 

[Skippy918]

I suppose it was when all 200 of us were called into a meeting and told we were losing our job. We never saw it coming and there were people there that had worked there for 30+ years.

This happened at my old company too. It was a small company, so half of the staff including me, got called into a meeting and we were given our walking papers. It surprised everyone, especially that a month or two prior we were told everything was fine.
I survived several rounds of layoffs at a different job and no one really knew those were coming either.

 

[bbak30]

I have a long list:
The time I was spit on.
The time I was kicked.
The time I was called a *****.
The time I had my hair grabbed.
The time I was bit.
The time I put a 7 month old in a body bag.
The time I had to tell a family their 23 year old daughter was dead.
The time I had to do a rape kit on a young girl that was murdered.
The time I had to bathe a 10 month old that was left in the car at a casino...in July.

I'm an ER nurse so this is my life. I don't have all bad days and have tons of good times to make up for all the sucky ones.

 

[disneychrista]

Worst thing that has happened to me on the job...I sliced my leg open when I was 16/17 while working at McDonalds. The front/control panel on the front of the fryer was open when I walked past it I ran into it. It tore my pants and sliced my leg. I am sure that I sure I should have gotten stitches but they never even sent me to the ER to get it checked out.

The worst I have done...well that is something I am not going to get into...

 

[Keli]

I'm with low key, having a gun pointed at me (a double barrel shotgun, over/under type barrel, the business end of that thing is seared into my memory). But I'm still here 30+ years later so clearly it ended ok. I've not had anything else nearly as scary or traumatic happen to me since.

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

It was just after I had gotten off work--finding out my grandfather was in the hospital, my mom waited til she knew I was off work before calling me as she didn't want me to worry. He died several days later.

It wasn't that it happened to me but that I was the lead person. A coworker of mine at a retail job I worked at in college was diabetic type 1. He had been feeling off the whole day and he let me know that if he called me over the walkie talkie to come to him. He trusted only me of who was working I guess. Well 20mins after telling me that he calls me. I find him in the back room. He had collapsed and was going into insulin shock. Called 911 was on the phone with them the whole time calming speaking to my coworker while trying to alert the front of the store without leaving my coworkers that the EMTs were going to be coming in from the front of the building, etc. Coworker went to the hospital, everything was fine after he got medical attention. Store manager came and said I have no idea how you were so calm. I responded that I didn't have any other option but to be calm especially given all the people out in the store, keeping my coworker calm, directing the 911 responder regarding what was going on, where our store was, the easiest entrance for a stretcher, etc.