Personal Injury Advocate
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Were you hurt by a machine at work?

We can help.

Are you in an emergency right now?

  • Call 911 if anyone is trapped, bleeding heavily, or seriously hurt.
  • Shut down or lock out the machine if you can do it safely.
  • Get away from moving parts.
  • Get medical care even if the injury seems minor at first.
  • This page is for after you are safe.

This page covers industrial accident claim deadlines and what to do right now. We are the injured person's advocate. We connect you with a lawyer who handles cases like yours, so you get the full settlement your recovery deserves. Always free. Talk to an advocate. We usually reply within minutes, at most one business day.

Factory and plant accidents are common, and many of them are preventable. Moving machine parts can cause crushed fingers or hands, amputations, burns, or worse, which is why OSHA (Occupational Safety and Health Administration) requires guards on dangerous machine parts (OSHA, Machine Guarding).

Why industrial accidents are tricky

Machine accidents look simple from the outside. A part was missing, or a guard was off, and someone got hurt. But proving what happened and getting it paid for is often harder than it looks.

This is a lot to track while you are also trying to heal. Read our work injury guide for the basics that apply to any on-the-job injury, not just machine accidents.

What real industrial accident cases have paid

These are publicly reported results from news coverage. They show how widely serious cases vary. They are examples only. We are not a law firm and this is not legal advice. No one can promise or predict what any case is worth, and many cases resolve for far less than these.

Talk to an advocate. You do not have to sort out OSHA citations and deadlines alone.

When it goes wrong: a true story

Jeremy Lewis lost his left arm in a 2006 machinery accident at a poultry plant in Alabama. It took six and a half years to resolve his workers' compensation claim, and he received $45,000. His family lost their home and moved to a trailer.

Josh Potter lost his hand in a die press accident in 2013, at an automotive supplier only 15 miles away, across the state line in Georgia. His lifetime benefits could total more than $740,000.

Same kind of accident. Same region of the country. Almost 20 times the difference in what each man received, because Alabama caps arm amputation payouts and Georgia does not, in the same way. A joint investigation by ProPublica and NPR (National Public Radio) found this "geographic lottery" repeats itself across the country, because each state sets its own rules with no federal floor (ProPublica, "How Much Is Your Arm Worth? Depends On Where You Work").

Neither man did anything wrong. The system itself is uneven, and payouts vary sharply by state. Talk to an advocate. They will introduce you to a lawyer who understands your state's rules from day one.

Protect your case

  1. Talk to an advocate at WeHelpInjured. It is free.
  2. Ask that the machine, part, and area be left as they are, if it is safe to do so. This helps investigators see what really happened.
  3. Write down what happened while it is fresh: what the machine was doing, whether a guard was missing or removed, and who else was nearby.
  4. Keep every paper: medical records, photos, your employer's incident report, and the name of anyone who witnessed the accident.
  5. If OSHA investigates, ask for a copy of any citation issued. This can matter later, so keep it with your other records.
  6. Warning: don't wait! The filing deadline is a trap, and workers' compensation rules differ sharply state to state, as shown above, so people wait, and waiting kills cases. The longer you wait, the fuzzier memories get and the machine can get repaired or scrapped before it is documented. Talk to an advocate immediately. Find your state on our state pages.

Never do these

What we can help with

All of it is free to you. We never take money from injured people.

Talk to an advocate. A machine accident can turn your life upside down in seconds.

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