See video demonstration of a Table Saw safety device in action---Will the inventor get his finger cut-off? You gotta see this!

Numerically the injuries that result from table saw accidents may be small, the "hebbie-jebbie" factor is quite high. The Comsumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) is proposing that table saws come equipped with the safety device demonstrated in this video. Yikes! Get ready to wince!

HT: Freakonomics...

"...At the same time, the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) has directed its staff to draft regulations governing the safety of table saws. An estimated 40,000 people are injured every year when hands, fingers or other body parts find their way into the path of a table saw blade. Inventor Stephen Gass has come up with a technology he calls SawStop, which senses if the spinning blade is starting to contact human skin and slams the blade to a halt within a few thousandths of a second. Gass even puts his finger into the path of the blade to demonstrate. See the video here.

The CPSC is apparently considering requiring that all new table saws come equipped with the SawStop technology, thus increasing the price of the product...""