A California carpenter suffered a horrifying injury when a power tool fired a nail through his tongue and into his skull on a construction site – and he is now suing the manufacturer over the allegedly defective device.
Timothy Kualii Kahae, 28, was fastening down plywood in the Bay Area on Nov. 15, 2021, using the Hitachi Pneumatic Nailer when it misfired and shot two nails at the same time, the Sacramento Bee reported, citing the lawsuit.
One of the nails struck the other, sending it through his tongue and into his skull, according to the complaint filed Nov. 3 in federal court.
The apprentice carpenter from San Francisco “went into shock” and was rushed to a Stanford clinic, where he underwent emergency surgery to remove the projectile, the lawsuit states.
Kahae also received multiple surgeries to repair his tongue, palate, nasal septum, sinuses, skull and a fractured jaw, the Mercury News reported, also citing the lawsuit.
“Timothy continues to experience numbness in his tongue where the nail went through it, which has led to stuttering,” the suit claims. “Timothy also is permanently scarred on his lower lip. These needless injuries will continue to plague Timothy for the rest of his young life.”
He has racked up over $400,000 in medical bills and lost out on $30,000 in wages as a result of the incident, according to the complaint.
Kahae is suing the tool’s manufacturers, Georgia-based Hitachi Koki U.S.A. and Koki Holdings Co., which is based in Japan, accusing them of negligence.
McClatchy News, owner of the Bee, reached out to the companies for comment but didn’t receive an immediate response.
In 2014, the companies issued a recall of more than 25,000 of their nail guns, the complaint states.
In its recall, the US Consumer Product Safety Commission included a hazard notice saying the “nailers can jam and override the safety switch that permits only one nail to fire at a time, posing an injury risk.”
The lawsuit alleges that the companies’ nail guns continue to have dangerous defects similar to the ones recalled in 2014.
“Defendants’ nailers possess defects that make them unreasonably dangerous for their intended use by consumers because of their propensity to jam and override the safety switch, causing two nails to fire at once; just as it did to Timothy,” the complaint states.
The suit alleges that Koki Holdings “failed to provide timely and adequate post-marketing warnings and instructions after they knew the risk of injury posed by their nailers.”
Kahae’s lawyers did not immediately respond to questions by the Mercury News about whether he was aware of the recall.
He is seeking a jury trial and unspecified damages.