I can promise you, not using the face shield is one of those things that after something happens, you really wish you did have it on.
I have taught classes and have students tell me they have been turning for hundreds of hours and never had a problem. I tell all my students that their personal safety is their own responsibility, and I do not force the use of face shields, but strongly recommend them. It only takes a second of broken concentration for disaster to happen.
We taught a class at John C Campbell where a student had not turned since high school (He was older than 65), and felt he did not need a face mask. Not only did the student take a bowl gouge and "shove" it into the segmented bowl blank, causing the bowl gouge to self feed to the bottom of the flute and proceed to throw the blank out of a very secure Vicmarc large chuck (the secureness of the piece was checked by both me and the instructor), the blank came up and split his forehead just 2 inches above his right eye. We were lucky to have a very seasoned emergency room nurse in the room, who quickly took charge of the situation and made a 10 stitch cut above his eye a walk in the park for the rest of us. We sent him off to the hospital after we had the bleeding stopped and he wasnt going to pass out.
The blank was a 10 inch segmented piece and was very heavy. He was lucky that it did not catch him in the eye, although the forehead was bad enough. Once the bowl blank had hit him in the head, it headed up to the 12 foot ceiling of the shop, came down on the floor, bounced over the feet of the resident artist just entering the shop through a door, climbed the wall, and then put a dent in the garage door about an inch deep and as big around as a softball.......The glue job on the segmented piece never failed.
After he left for the emergency room, EVERY STUDENT DONNED A FACE MASK. There were only two students wearing them before the accident, and they were a husband and wife who had not turned before.
PLEASE WEAR PROTECTIVE EQUIPMENT AT ALL TIMES....IT TAKES JUST A MICROSECOND TO CAUSE A PROBLEM!!!!!!!!! Wishing you had one on after the accident does not help you!!!!!
As an instructor, it is very hard to feel good about a class if someone is hurt in the process of learning. We try to teach safety as well as the skills needed to complete the projects. Please keep listening to the echo of Norm's safety warning in the back of your head when using power tools! BE SAFE!!