Shattered tables: The dangers of glass

In his basement, David Chesney keeps the frame of a metal patio table with a missing glass top as a grim reminder of an accident that scarred his daughter's face.

Jada, 11 months old at the time, was sitting on the edge of the table, facing her dad when the accident happened.

"All of a sudden, out of the blue, it was like a big gunshot went off," says Chesney, who lives in Mount Pearl, Nfld. "My hands went up and Jada sort of fell in a backward motion."

As she fell through the glass, the shards sliced "wide open gashes" in her baby cheeks, says Chesney. "It was just as if you took a razor, and you just went up and down her face."

Injuries from glass tabletops aren't rare. In the United States, an estimated 20,000 people are seriously injured from glass tables every year, according to the Consumers Union, a non-profit that publishes Consumer Reports magazine.

No national statistics are kept in Canada, but the BC Children's Hospital in Vancouver says their emergency room doctors have treated 57 kids over the past 15 years after accidents with glass tabletops.

"And the numbers may be higher," says spokesperson Tracy Tang. "These numbers reflect only lacerations that were specifically noted to have been caused by glass tables that broke."

Regular vs. tempered glass

CBC decided to test how different types of glass shatter to see whether tables can be made with safer materials.

At Vancouver Glass, a glass repair shop where they've replaced plenty of tabletops, I took a hammer to a coffee table made with regular glass and another that made with tempered glass (wearing safety glasses and gloves, of course).

While the regular glass broke into large, razor-sharp shards, the tempered glass endured a couple of strikes before it shattered on the third try.

When the tempered glass finally broke, it fractured into small cubes with rounded edges. Tempered glass, also known as a type of safety glass, is four to five times stronger than regular glass.

"If you fall into a table with regular glass, the injuries can be fatal," says Vancouver Glass employee Tom Lennie.

Last December, an 11-year old girl bled to death in Providence, R.I., after crashing through a glass table.

Calls for rules to change

So why aren't all glass tabletops made with tempered glass?

Glass doors and windows near doors have to be made out of tempered glass, but there's no such standard when it comes to tables.

"I think it's something that the government should address, and change the rules," says Lennie.

Health Canada told CBC-TV's Marketplace that the federal agency is monitoring incidents to "better understand the safety-related problems that might occur with these types of products."

A Health Canada spokesperson acknowledges that they've known about the problem for years.

Back in his basement, Chesney pulls out a black, plastic garbage bag, full of the telltale shards that scarred his daughter back in 2005.

When he bought the table, he says a store clerk told him the glass was tempered. But these shards don't look like tempered glass.

"If you ask anyone, and you show anyone, they say that's not tempered correctly," he says.

There are no standards in place to even make sure tempered glass is manufactured properly.

So Chesney's not taking any more chances. Because there's no guarantee in Canada that a glass table is safe, he says he'll never buy one again.