Learned this the hard way at my own shop when I grabbed a piece of 1 inch square bar with cold tongs and felt that bite slip about halfway to the anvil. Nothing like watching a glowing hot bar bounce across the floor while you stand there in your apron like a total idiot. Now I keep a little dunk routine too, just a few seconds in the slack tub and the jaws grab way better. It's not rocket science, hot metal pulls heat out of the tongs and then the tongs get hot enough to lose their grip. My old teacher called it lazy man's forge sense, meaning if you skip it you're gonna pay for it.

I used to roll my eyes at stuff like this, figured people were just being dramatic about a book. Then I read one that hit a little too close to home and ended up sitting in my truck for 20 minutes trying to pull myself together. Some writers just know exactly where to stick the knife.