We all have bad days. Things don’t go our way, we forget to fuel up the car, our favorite shirts have a rip and your boss is asking you to come in on your day off. What can often help is a little bit of perspective, because as bad as you might have it, someone else could be doing worse.

That’s why we have gathered some examples of folks having some of the worst days at work possible. So prepare yourself for either a good amount of schadenfreude or sympathy as you scroll through. Be sure to upvote your favorite posts and comment about your worst day at work below. 

#1 Nice Job

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#2 My Coworker Left His Phone Under The Industrial Paper Cutter

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#3 What I Was Greeted By This Moring At Work, First Day After Christmas Break

Image credits: DekuTheOtaku

Despite the objectively horrible time these folks had, as the saying goes, there is always a bigger fish, or in this case, workplace disaster. For example, bringing dads to their knees across the globe, the London Beer Flood of 1814, when a number of huge wooden vats for fermenting porter broke, caused a chain reaction that flooded the neighborhood. 

When the vat broke, the deluge of liquid slammed into other vats, breaking them and adding to the “avalanche” of beer. Between 580,000 and 1,470,000 liters of beer smashed through the brewery walls and cascaded through the neighborhood. 

#4 Knelt Down To Get A Ping Pong Ball From Under The Table At Work And Heard A Little Rip

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#5 A Truck Carrying A Tank Of White Paint Dropped It On The Road

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#6 This “Gift” For Employee Appreciation Day

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Like something out of a hybrid of a disaster movie and comedy, a 15-foot (4.6 m) wave of beer rushed through the area, demolishing two houses and leading to eight deaths. As the area had very poor drainage, much of the beer ended up in the basements of nearby buildings, which at the time were often inhabited. 

#7 My Sister Works At A Starbucks And This Was Someone’s “Simple” Order

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#8 Someone Reported Me To HR For A Suspected Drug Use, Saying I Must Do Them In My Truck While At Work. HR Opened An Investigation. This Is Literally Powdered Sugar From The Fried Oreos

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#9 I Left My Job Shortly After Receiving This Prize For My Good Work

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While later accounts state that mass drinking followed, the papers at the time made no such reports. Similarly, the beer would have been so diluted and dirty as to not really be drinkable at all. However, there are verified accounts of watchmen charging people to go and see the ruins and burst vats. 

#10 You Think You’re Having A Bad Day? Just Think About The Poor Guy Who Will Be Forced To Clean This Up

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#11 Overnight Coworker Sent Me This Last Night

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#12 Car Crashed Into My Bakery At Work, Old Lady Accidentally Hit Her Gas Instead Of Brakes

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The only upside of the disaster is that it did spark some changes in how breweries operate. After the London Beer Flood, breweries started to use vessels lined with concrete, to ensure that something similar does not happen again. The company itself continued to operate until 1961, relatively unphased by the chaos. 

#13 I Have A Costco Box Full Of These At Work, Just Ate One Yesterday. This Entire Bar Was Infested With These… Things

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#14 I’m A Janitor In A High School. Kids Are Dumb

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#15 My 6-Feet Husband Started A New Job, This Is The Uniform They Gave Him. And It Is My Fault As I Took The Measurements. Even His Boss Ended Up Laughing

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A recent equivalent was the Pepsi fruit juice flood, in 2017, which occurred in Lebedyan, Russia. The roof of a PepsiCo warehouse collapsed, sending over 28 million liters (7.4 million US gallons) flooding through the streets and into the Don River. Luckily, there were no casualties, and studies of the river reported no major environmental impact, although one must imagine that the streets had to be sticky for a while. 

#16 I Find It Amusing How The Forklift Driver Must Have Been Staring Directly At The “Do Not Stack” Sign

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#17 My Father Was Almost Pulled Into A Lathe While Working. Only Stopped By His Clothing Being Tangled

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#18 I’ve Had To Take A Couple Weeks Off Work Because I’m Allergic To Part Of My Job

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However, the vast majority of us will not be impacted by disasters at this scale. First and foremost, they simply do not happen that often, as there are tens of thousands of factories, mills, and breweries around the globe that do not explode. Similarly, safety regulations, on the whole, tend to improve from one disaster to the next. 

#19 Hubby Was Unemployed For 9 Months. Finally Landed A Job That’s Not Temporary Or A Contract Gig. 5 Minutes After Clocking In, He Trips On Some Carpet And Breaks His Leg

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#20 Guess Someone’s Gonna Be Late For Work

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#21 This Glove I Put On At Work Before Going Into Surgery Had Dozens Of Pin Prick Holes In The Fingers. The Entire Box Was Like This

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So while most of us won’t be anywhere near an accidental explosion, there still are a number of common workplace risks to be on the lookout for. According to UK-based law firm, Waldrons, most of the time, people simply slip, fall, or sprain something while just going about their day. Let’s face it, who among us hasn’t twisted an ankle in a pothole or tripped on a carpet? 

#22 My Company Is Sending Work From Home Employees New Laptops. I Somehow Ended Up With All Of Them

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#23 My Coworker “Locked” Me In The Porta Potty And Then Went To Lunch

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#24 This Mirrored Ceiling In Our Bathroom At Work

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Other “usual suspects” are repetitive strain injuries, where a certain, common, workplace action over time causes some injury or pain to a worker. This can range from simply typing too much to lifting loads that are just too heavy. While there are techniques that employees can use to minimize risk, some unscrupulous businesses will demand that workers work a certain way. 

#25 The Truck Driver Who Forgot To Release The Bolts Of The Container In Ashdod Port This Morning

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#26 Eggsactly What He Feared Would Happen

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#27 I Almost Burned Down Our Office Today When A Phone Charger Went Up In Flames

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Loud noises are another constant in many lines of work, and employees should demand ear protection at certain levels of volume. Even if the sound seems reasonable, long-term exposure to loud noises puts the person at risk of tinnitus and even catastrophic hearing loss later in life, which often can be avoided. 

#28 Had A Leak Develop In Our Laboratory This Morning. Nobody Was On Campus To Catch It So There Was 4 Inches Of Standing Water And Countless Ruined Pieces Of Equipment

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#29 I (30-Year-Old Male) Participated In Secret Santa At Work, Asked For Sports Equipment, Got This Instead

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#30 Coworker’s Car Caught On Fire While He Was Working

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So it never hurts to acknowledge the risks. And lists like this can help you observe the results of bad working conditions from a safe distance. If you want to see more examples like this, worry not, Bored Panda has got you covered. Check out our previous article on folks who are having a terrible day and our article on work accidents. 

#31 My Coworker Found A Tooth In His Lunch Sandwich’s Meat

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#32 Today I Lost My Job And My Bike

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#33 A Generous Tip For Someone Working At A Restaurant

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#34 I’m A Gym Manager And This Happened To Me This Morning When I Was About To Open

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#35 New Year’s Eve At Work A Few Years Back. Was Refilling The Stock On The Bottom Shelf And The Whole Thing Collapsed, Almost Caught My Arm

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#36 Coming Into Work To Discover That Someone Left The Ice Machine’s Door Open Overnight

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#37 My Colleague Did Not Calculate The Height Of The Truck, And How Low The Bridge Was

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#38 Damn Near Cut My Dong Off Today… Two Things That Stopped It From Happening: 1) My Big Guts 2) My Small Wiener

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#39 Forced To Work In The Office And They Replaced The Toilet Paper With This

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#40 Happened On My Way To Work

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#41 The Ceiling Leaked All Over The Computers At Work

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#42 My Coworker Decided To Wipe The Monitor With Clorox Bleach Wipes

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#43 Yesterday This Guy Put Ghost Pepper Popcorn In Our Industrial Microwave At Work For Over 5 Minutes. The Office Was Filled With Black Smoke Burning People’s Eyes, No One Could Breath

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#44 Stack Of Blueberries Fell Over At Work Today

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#45 Someone At Work Perfectly-Ripped My Husband Out Of The Wedding Photo On My Locker. There’s No Way This Was Accidental

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#46 A Guy At My Workplace Uses This Bathroom Every Day, And Each Day He Leaves His “Nest” Behind. It’s Disgusting And Disrespectful To The Cleaning Staff

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#47 I Got A $0.25 Raise This Year Which Absolutely Is Not Keeping Pace With Inflation. And Then I Get To Walk Into Work And See The Owner’s New Toy

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#48 We Can Cut Into The Concrete Here They Said. It Will Be Fine They Said

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#49 Workmates Made A Birthday “Party” To Me At The Office. They Didn’t Realize I Work The Night Shift. They Ate And Celebrated It Without Me

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#50 I Work In Pharmaceuticals, This Was A Very Expensive Mistake

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#51 After Working 3 Positions And Managing 20 Employees, Here’s My Work Christmas Gift

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#52 A Group Of Teenagers Came In Just To Trash The Theater

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#53 Boss Decided Not To Tell Me In Person To Come In On Sunday When He Had The Chance To Do So During My Working Hours On Saturday, And So, I Was Awakened By This Message

Please? Yeah, please don’t send those late-night texts (like seriously, a nearly 2 AM message).

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#54 “We Have A Coffee Machine Somewhere”, “Looks Clean To Me” – This Is What A Lady At The Office Told Me Today When I Tried To Have Some Coffee

Usually, I am too busy for a coffee break. It was a slow Friday, so I decided I could try to have some coffee for a change. Definitely did not use this mess.

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#55 My Boss Installed A Water Dispenser Yesterday. This Morning We Got Into The Office To This

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#56 Staff Forgot To Cover Up The Pool Tables At A College Bar On A Friday Night

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#57 My Girlfriend’s Job’s Coffee Maker Just Melted Away

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#58 I Told My Employees That I Would Bring In A TV So That They Could Enjoy March Madness While At Work

I had this TV hanging around in a spare room of my house.

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#59 The Restaurant I Work At Occasionally Hosts A Drag Brunch. This Past Week We’ve Been Receiving Calls Threatening To Protest Against An Upcoming Brunch. This Vandalism Happened Overnight

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#60 When The Mowing Guy At Work Shatters The Window Of Your New Car And Doesn’t Tell Anybody

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#61 My Coworker Stocks The Coolers At My Work, And His Dandruff Is On Every Single Can

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#62 30 Minutes From Completing A Job And This Happens

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#63 I Got The Chopping Board Stuck In The Sink At Work

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#64 The Toilet Paper At My Work Is So Cheap It Has Splinters

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#65 Someone Brought Cheerio Donuts Into Work Today

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#66 My Desk Collapsed At Work And There’s No Empty Ones To Move To

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#67 2 Minutes Into Work And I Find This

My colleague told me the self-service had been acting up all morning. I popped the lid open to find the problem. Now I’m left with more questions than answers.

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#68 Customer Guessed I Was Around 3-4 Months Along. I’m Not Pregnant

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#69 I Work At A Non-Profit Child Care Facility. We Like To Leave Our Pavilion Open To The Public After Our Children Leave. There Is A Garbage Can In Each Corner Of The Pavilion

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#70 The New “Break Room” At My Former Job – I Guess The Old One Was Too Nice For Us

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#71 Accidentally Locked Myself In The Toilet Stall At My New Job. It Won’t Turn All The Way Open

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#72 The Water Coming Out Of The Kitchen Faucet At Work. I Work At A Restaurant

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#73 Found My Car Like This When I Took A Break At Work

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#74 The 12-Dollar Salad I Got At Work Contained Seven Inedible Lettuce Parts

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#75 The Staff Bathroom At My Job (Dog Daycare) Where Customers Spend 50 Dollars A Night To Board Their Dogs

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#76 Keyboard At My New Job’s Work Computer

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#77 My Girlfriend Has Asked For Reduced Hours At Her Work For 2 Weeks And She Was Ignored. Today She Asked To Come In Late And This Was The “Manager’s” Response

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#78 The Break Room At My Job

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#79 I Have Multiple Pairs Of Work Shoes And Today I Brought 2 Left-Foot Shoes

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#80 The Warehouse I Work At Was Number 1 In The Company For The 1st Quarter, Management Promised A Huge Reward, This Was It

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Source: boredpanda.com