[Happened to someone in Rhode Island](https://www.wpri.com/news/local-news/south-county/police-westerly-man-died-after-firework-was-set-off-on-his-head/amp/) ~~this week~~ not long ago too. I thought this article was about that, tbh. Turns out, idiots abound.
How do people not realize these are fucking explosives. Small ones, but still. People loose fingers and hands from the smallest ones. And they want to launch a mortar from their dome?
Back in the 80s my boyfriend was selling fireworks out of the trunk of his car. I'll never forget my brother's friend's dad coming back to buy more with his hand freshly bandaged by the ER from the first batch he bought.
My grandfather was a firefighter and that instilled in me a deep respect for anything to do with fire. I love a professional fireworks show but I'm not going anywhere near touching them
Because in all honestly they don’t get treated like it. It’s like hey come on down to Walmart or the big bright colored USA FREEDOM FREEDOM tent and buy our big boxes with in your face packaging, colors and funny names.
The packaging on the big ones should honestly be way more serious to really drive home the point that they’re explosives and not that far off from a weapon in terms of sheer force exerted. Just because the “warhead” is just some funny firework powder doesn’t mean the initial blast that sends it up won’t kill you
Fundamental ignorance on how explosions work, they can be the same force as being flicked in the forehead to more force than the bones/skin/connective tissue can withstand period.
Because the modern world is, overall, so safe some people just intrinsically assume everything is safe. It's the same thinking that leads to people trying to pet bison in national parks
Whats with all of these guys being around 40ish exploding their heads with fireworks? I'm 45 and I have never once thought "you know I should put an explosive right next to my brain"
Mostly alcohol. Adults treat the 4th like spring break and if you mix explosives with that then this is the result.
I walked by a small July 4th party where a group of parents were clearly getting plastered and all the kids just looked bored and annoyed as their parents blasted music and danced and did drunken shenanigans. I hate how mainstream abusing alcohol is. Worse, this is how these kids will always remember their parents on holidays. A lot of adults have failed to grow up it seems and are just big teenagers. It’s that mentality that has people putting fireworks on their heads. I wish it was called out more.
Wouldn't be the first people who have to remember gruesome injuries every fourth. People are fucking idiots and have been mangling themselves with fireworks for decades. They overstaff on ER staff and surgeons the night of the fourth for example.
14 people were just injured in this California beach town, a 3 year old is in the hospital with a collapsed lung. Mortars going everywhere.
https://kymkemp.com/2024/07/05/mass-casualty-incident-on-crescent-city-beach-after-fireworks-accident-yesterday/
Most professional fireworks are fired from tube's like military mortars. Thats why this article called them mortars, they are. They can range from little inch tube displays arranged to fire in a row from a box to the 3, 4, 6, 8, 10, and 12inch diameter tubes 3 feet in length designed launch them high up.
Over the years, more and more people are getting them "illegally" and trying to act like professionals. And we end up with incidents like this.
Source: have worked with professional fireworks and responded to emergencies involving them as FF/EMS.
Not just this year. Some states turn blind eyes to the sale of professional mortar style fireworks and idiots then take them home to suburbia and create incidents like this.
Between these kinds of calls and drunk drivers, the 4th isn't a very fun holiday.
Saw a video of a guy light one while holding it in his hands at one of those car meet-ups. There was a large flash and then it was like his hands were replaced with half a pound of linguine. All I can think is what was the plan?
There are people that must have absolutely terrible mental models of how things work. The plan was color and light come out the tube and the fire work goes up, no more but maybe less.
There was video going around from a local teenager who was playing with fireworks and had a hand turn into linguine. You couldn’t see any major gore (thankfully), but there was tons of blood and he was obviously in shock. Terrible to happen when his brain wasn’t fully developed yet.
You know, I lit a few of those and there is no way I want to be anywhere near one when they fire. I even have to cover my ears. They are THAT dangerous! And this guy still said "HOLD MY BEER!"
Even if it's the tube, the whole point of it is to contain all of the energy of the blast and use the ground to hold it back. Theres a huge amount of focused energy being released... It's not gonna be a good time even if you're trying to launch from the tube.
Just happened a few days ago to someone else https://www.boston.com/news/local-news/2024/07/05/rhode-island-man-died-after-firework-set-off-on-his-head-police-say/
Guy in our school was doing this and it blew up in his face and he lost an eye. The weirdo became an even bigger weirdo after that, taking his glass eye out all the time, holding it in his hand and saying I'm watching you.
I knew a guy who worked in tile had both eyes. He came back a few months later and he was missing an eye. Nothing was there.
People please wear safety goggles.
[Ballistic High Speed did a YouTube video of putting fireworks against human dummies just this week. ](https://youtu.be/iT5ItEDEst0?si=-cJdjCrSrIl8ceqz) People really don't respect the power of even some cheap ass fireworks. It's sad.
A dude here in Chicago tried to re-light a wick on a rather large mortar a d blew his head off, dying instantly.
Notes: Lol, that last bit turned it to generate some pretty fucking funny responses.
Anyway
Dude was named Earl Leroy
He literally Lerooooooy Jenkins'd
Sad shit is he was a father, whose kids may or may have seen it go down
Skull and brain matter all over the alley according to some people that are friends with cops on the scene
Earl Lory (fixed spelling thx). Looked down the tube of a delayed mortar.
https://www.arlingtoncardinal.com/2024/07/chicago-dad-killed-by-fireworks-device-launched-from-a-mortar-tube-on-kostner-ave-chicago/
This happened to one of the professionals who put on our town’s firework show when I was a youngster growing up in Montana. He thought the firework was a dud and put his head over the giant tube to look at it.
You’ll never guess what happened next…
Even as kids (well, Future Mad Scientists of America, pyromaniac division) we knew about “hangfires” and not to mess with them. Never assume it’s a dud. We’d give one about 15-20 minutes before approaching it and then did so very slowly. We all still have all of our fingers. Oh, we set our stuff off on a beach. No fires, damaged property, or ourselves.
Unfortunately the only way for people to learn this stuff is from responsible adults. For as wack as my dad was he sure did teach me about firework and firearm safety.
My dad started with safety lessons, but as he got deeper into the beer he became the bad example demonstrating disasters. At least once he set the front pasture on fire with bottle rockets, nearly got the front porch.
The first 4th of July left on my own, he gave me $100 worth of fireworks to set off with friends. Zero accidents or mishaps, with all bottle rockets very carefully aimed up in weighted bases, none of that empty beer bottle resting loosely on the ground shit.
It's always sad when a firework fails to go off. You don't want to re-light it because that's extremely dangerous, but it's a waste of money to just soak it and be done.
It feels like Loony Tunes logic. I wonder if some people think it’s like the cartoons or the TV shows and their face will blacken and their hair stand up and then in the next scene they will be back to normal again.
> Paige [his wife] said Allen worked hard, played hard and ultimately died doing what he loved.
Well, what more’s there to say than “he died doing what he loved”? 🤷♂️
Tbf if your grieving that friend who always did crazy things that ended up killing them like everyone told them it would. Its one comfort you have to balm the pain of losing them
> “He was holding this firework over his top hat,” Paige later told The Post and Courier.
It was one of those comically huge top hats too - there’s a video preview showing it in the article. Nobody knows what he was thinking but he probably figured it would protect him. Fireworks are entertaining and have lots of cool effects and nice looking colors, but they are still dangerous explosives.
> Allen told his son on the night of the incident that this Independence Day celebration would be their official father-son blowout to celebrate Hunter’s wedding day and his engagement. **Then he planned to stop drinking for a while.**
> **“Alan was not a drinker,”** said Paige. “Everyone was drinking a little last night, but he didn’t drink regularly.”
Seems like a slight contradiction?
This could almost pass as satire, they’ve included a video of him dancing in front of fireworks in a 4th of July themed suit and included that he told his son this would be their big father and son blowout to celebrate his upcoming wedding.
One of the shows on my local sports station used to due a bit after every 4th of July reading and mocking stories like these.
They stopped a couple years ago because he felt like even though a lot of these people are doing very dumb things, it's still tragic.
His poor wife saw it and told him to stop it and then it went off. She saw her husband's head explode right in front of her basically.
A lot of people in this thread are just saying that he was an idiot (not wrong, well known fact that playing with fireworks is a no-no) and not thinking about much beyond that it seems.
Say what you will about him, her, or whatever comes to mind when someone calls themselves/their spouse a "patriot" in 2024... That's the kind of thing you carry with you forever, you can't see your husband die in an instant and not be fucked up for life because of it. Your whole life, just changed forever in an instant.
Losing my husband is my greatest fear. I hope she has lots of good support around her.
I scrolled past at least 3 trauma and ER docs on TikTok saying please keep your hands, genitals and overall bodies away from fireworks because they had indeed, seen it all.
Exploding devices are the thing I'd keep furthest from my head, but okay... Sounds like he died instantly (according to the other article linked in comments) and must have been pretty drunk, so he probably didn't feel a thing.
I believe that every year, someone launches a mortar off their head and dies.
How do people not know this is a bad idea by now?
Like birthday candles and silly string or walking up on a pinata.
Stop making the same mistakes!!!!
I went to college with a guy missing 3 fingers from one hand after a July 4th accident.
I made sure my kids got introduced to him at our reunion, they got the message.
I knew a kid in high school that lost his right index finger forever because he held onto a mortar for too long at a house party.
No fucking way in hell would I ever put an explosive strong enough to blow a persons hand off on top of my head.
Goddammit. There was literally a post on r/Disney about a Gaston character actor that died from doing this right before the 4th. Was that prophetic or is this just... common?
> Details also confirm that bystanders attempted to stop the incident.
Bet there was some version of, "You guys are a bunch of pussies.. I know what I'm doing!" said before his head cratered and splattered.
If I had a nickel for every time a guy died *from putting a firework on his head*, I'd have two nickels. Which isn't a lot, but it's weird that it happened twice
Earlier today I read about a Disney employee who died this exact same way 9 years ago and now this, so yeah, 2 nickels
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/lifestyle/lifestyle-news/disney-world-gaston-actor-dead-806834/
It also happened to a man here in the Seattle area. SMH
https://www.kiro7.com/news/local/man-loses-life-redmond-fireworks-accident/WUQT7A3QT5GFVDNBUPDKRL4KDQ/
This guy made it to 45.
https://komonews.com/news/local/redmond-fireworks-accident-death-killed-man-bothell-hit-struck-head-avondale-road-cpr-washington-king-county-explosion-fourth-of-july-4th-parking-lot-detectives-police-officers-investigation
He won't be doing this again.. only if he knew fireworks were illegal there.
I literally just read yesterday on Reddit how a former Disney employee did the same thing but I guess was a bit more worse. I was like damn “I wonder how many people are going to do something stupid today and end up dead due to fireworks”
Now here I am reading this a day later
The older I get, the more of these stories I hear, it’s hard to have empathy when I read these stories. At this point I think you should need a license to buy and set off fireworks.
I wonder what society would be like if anytime someone gets hurt when alcohols involved, alcohol gets included in the headline to highlight its dangers.
Seeing this headline as a Floridian: "Please don't be Florida. Please don't be Florida. Please don't be Florida."
Clicks link: "'SUMMERVILLE, S.C.' Oh thank God."
This happened to a young man in Maine a few years ago too. He put a mortar on his head and lit it up in front of his friends. Dead.
[Happened to someone in Rhode Island](https://www.wpri.com/news/local-news/south-county/police-westerly-man-died-after-firework-was-set-off-on-his-head/amp/) ~~this week~~ not long ago too. I thought this article was about that, tbh. Turns out, idiots abound.
How do people not realize these are fucking explosives. Small ones, but still. People loose fingers and hands from the smallest ones. And they want to launch a mortar from their dome?
Back in the 80s my boyfriend was selling fireworks out of the trunk of his car. I'll never forget my brother's friend's dad coming back to buy more with his hand freshly bandaged by the ER from the first batch he bought.
If at first you don't succeed
Safety third.
put one up your nose
My grandfather was a firefighter and that instilled in me a deep respect for anything to do with fire. I love a professional fireworks show but I'm not going anywhere near touching them
My father was a firefighter that brought home all the illegal fireworks people turned in so we could safely dispose of them……….on Fourth of July :)
Because in all honestly they don’t get treated like it. It’s like hey come on down to Walmart or the big bright colored USA FREEDOM FREEDOM tent and buy our big boxes with in your face packaging, colors and funny names. The packaging on the big ones should honestly be way more serious to really drive home the point that they’re explosives and not that far off from a weapon in terms of sheer force exerted. Just because the “warhead” is just some funny firework powder doesn’t mean the initial blast that sends it up won’t kill you
Fundamental ignorance on how explosions work, they can be the same force as being flicked in the forehead to more force than the bones/skin/connective tissue can withstand period.
Because the modern world is, overall, so safe some people just intrinsically assume everything is safe. It's the same thinking that leads to people trying to pet bison in national parks
> people trying to bet bison in national parks Gambling addiction is hard to deal with though.
It happened here in the Seattle area as well https://www.kiro7.com/news/local/man-loses-life-redmond-fireworks-accident/WUQT7A3QT5GFVDNBUPDKRL4KDQ/
Whats with all of these guys being around 40ish exploding their heads with fireworks? I'm 45 and I have never once thought "you know I should put an explosive right next to my brain"
You can’t afford the really powerful fireworks in your 20s.
This is exactly it. Adults with adult money spending on a kids dream.
I don’t get it either. I believe most of these men did it in front of their kids. Why would anyone model such horrible behavior?
Mostly alcohol. Adults treat the 4th like spring break and if you mix explosives with that then this is the result. I walked by a small July 4th party where a group of parents were clearly getting plastered and all the kids just looked bored and annoyed as their parents blasted music and danced and did drunken shenanigans. I hate how mainstream abusing alcohol is. Worse, this is how these kids will always remember their parents on holidays. A lot of adults have failed to grow up it seems and are just big teenagers. It’s that mentality that has people putting fireworks on their heads. I wish it was called out more.
Wow expected these to be like 20 yr olds but Seattle dude was 45, Rhode island dude was 39, Chicago dude was 34.
Middle-aged dads getting drunk and goofing around to trying to entertain their kids are peak idiocy
Those poor families now have to probably think about their dad’s head exploding every Independence Day.
Wouldn't be the first people who have to remember gruesome injuries every fourth. People are fucking idiots and have been mangling themselves with fireworks for decades. They overstaff on ER staff and surgeons the night of the fourth for example.
The Rhode Island one happened on Mother’s Day, that’s how I knew it was different.
What a way to celebrate Mothers Day.
14 people were just injured in this California beach town, a 3 year old is in the hospital with a collapsed lung. Mortars going everywhere. https://kymkemp.com/2024/07/05/mass-casualty-incident-on-crescent-city-beach-after-fireworks-accident-yesterday/
Why are there so many mortars lying around???
Most professional fireworks are fired from tube's like military mortars. Thats why this article called them mortars, they are. They can range from little inch tube displays arranged to fire in a row from a box to the 3, 4, 6, 8, 10, and 12inch diameter tubes 3 feet in length designed launch them high up. Over the years, more and more people are getting them "illegally" and trying to act like professionals. And we end up with incidents like this. Source: have worked with professional fireworks and responded to emergencies involving them as FF/EMS.
Yet many states still sell mortars legally. Even putting a legal mortar on one’s head.. I can’t think that’d turn on much different illegal or not.
Better question, why are there so many fucking morons?
i quite vividly recall the second amendment saying "the right to bear mortars" but i could be wrong who knows
I remember that too! I’d go fact check but my eyes don’t work so well anymore. Because of the motars, of course.
The internet made them easy to acquire this year.
Not just this year. Some states turn blind eyes to the sale of professional mortar style fireworks and idiots then take them home to suburbia and create incidents like this. Between these kinds of calls and drunk drivers, the 4th isn't a very fun holiday.
Jesus. That 3-year old flatlined while being airlifted to another hospital.
I just read about a former Disney parks actor who died this way a few years ago.
Should call it getting "Gastoned"
No one Fights like Gaston. No one lights like Gaston. No one blows off their head wearing tights, like Gaston
For there's no man in town half as manly Despite, his head being gone
Saw a video of a guy light one while holding it in his hands at one of those car meet-ups. There was a large flash and then it was like his hands were replaced with half a pound of linguine. All I can think is what was the plan?
There are people that must have absolutely terrible mental models of how things work. The plan was color and light come out the tube and the fire work goes up, no more but maybe less.
Yeah, they've probably seen people launch bottle rockets while holding them and figure "same thing, right"
There was video going around from a local teenager who was playing with fireworks and had a hand turn into linguine. You couldn’t see any major gore (thankfully), but there was tons of blood and he was obviously in shock. Terrible to happen when his brain wasn’t fully developed yet.
You know, I lit a few of those and there is no way I want to be anywhere near one when they fire. I even have to cover my ears. They are THAT dangerous! And this guy still said "HOLD MY BEER!"
Like he put the shell from the mortar on his head? Or did he have the mortar tube on his head and launched the shell from it
Even if it's the tube, the whole point of it is to contain all of the energy of the blast and use the ground to hold it back. Theres a huge amount of focused energy being released... It's not gonna be a good time even if you're trying to launch from the tube.
Same thing happened to a someone a few years back. They held the firework tube to their chest like it was a cannon and lit it. They died instantly.
I looked into it and it was the mortar without the tube
Just happened a few days ago to someone else https://www.boston.com/news/local-news/2024/07/05/rhode-island-man-died-after-firework-set-off-on-his-head-police-say/
I’m kind of surprised he made it to 41
“Details also confirm that bystanders attempted to stop the incident.” Gonna go out on a limb and say so were his neighbors.
Trying to convince a drunk person not to do something they’ve got their mind set on is like pulling teeth
I wonder how many times in his life he said "Does This Look Infected?" 41 is pretty young, I guess that was just his Sum when you're that dumb.
Got more than a fat lip
Storming through the party like my name was El Niño
I don’t wanna waaaste my time, become another casualty of society… 🥴
Definitely in too deep
and I’m tryin’ to keep, a bomb on my head, instead of goin under
Everybody's got their problems
He had a bright future ahead of him
At least on top of him
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I remember in high school tearing apart fireworks to make our own home-made version with the parts. Man we were dumb. Luckily we survived.
Guy in our school was doing this and it blew up in his face and he lost an eye. The weirdo became an even bigger weirdo after that, taking his glass eye out all the time, holding it in his hand and saying I'm watching you.
I knew a guy who worked in tile had both eyes. He came back a few months later and he was missing an eye. Nothing was there. People please wear safety goggles.
“I’m going to try something. I saw it in a cartoon once but I’m pretty sure I can do it.”
All that matters is if he lived long enough to pass on those stupid genes.
According to other articles he had an adult son who is engaged, so yeh he already reproduced.
Woof, imagine being so dumb that when you die people are bummed you managed to procreate first.
Do the kids gain an advantage by learning to not play around with explosives?
We can only figure this out if we have them do an explosives skill check for easy pete.
[Ballistic High Speed did a YouTube video of putting fireworks against human dummies just this week. ](https://youtu.be/iT5ItEDEst0?si=-cJdjCrSrIl8ceqz) People really don't respect the power of even some cheap ass fireworks. It's sad.
I thought of that. Brains everywhere.
Crazy how many people don't understand that they're bombs. Colourful, pretty bombs.
A dude here in Chicago tried to re-light a wick on a rather large mortar a d blew his head off, dying instantly. Notes: Lol, that last bit turned it to generate some pretty fucking funny responses. Anyway Dude was named Earl Leroy He literally Lerooooooy Jenkins'd Sad shit is he was a father, whose kids may or may have seen it go down Skull and brain matter all over the alley according to some people that are friends with cops on the scene
Earl Lory (fixed spelling thx). Looked down the tube of a delayed mortar. https://www.arlingtoncardinal.com/2024/07/chicago-dad-killed-by-fireworks-device-launched-from-a-mortar-tube-on-kostner-ave-chicago/
This happened to one of the professionals who put on our town’s firework show when I was a youngster growing up in Montana. He thought the firework was a dud and put his head over the giant tube to look at it. You’ll never guess what happened next…
https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-montana-standard-fireworks-accident/33751436/
The result was mind blowing!
I didn't hear he tried to re light it, but only check on a failed tube. Man that sucks.
Even as kids (well, Future Mad Scientists of America, pyromaniac division) we knew about “hangfires” and not to mess with them. Never assume it’s a dud. We’d give one about 15-20 minutes before approaching it and then did so very slowly. We all still have all of our fingers. Oh, we set our stuff off on a beach. No fires, damaged property, or ourselves.
Unfortunately the only way for people to learn this stuff is from responsible adults. For as wack as my dad was he sure did teach me about firework and firearm safety.
My dad started with safety lessons, but as he got deeper into the beer he became the bad example demonstrating disasters. At least once he set the front pasture on fire with bottle rockets, nearly got the front porch. The first 4th of July left on my own, he gave me $100 worth of fireworks to set off with friends. Zero accidents or mishaps, with all bottle rockets very carefully aimed up in weighted bases, none of that empty beer bottle resting loosely on the ground shit.
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He survived instantly
I much prefer this to *gradual survival*
To shreds you say
And his wife?
Oh, my
To shreds you say
Lots of people survive dying instantly so maybe.
I died instantly once.
My girlfriend died instantly once back when I was in high school. We met online and she’s from Canada so you wouldn’t really know her..
I remember that. It was when you snorted 4 marijuanas in a row.
He died instantly… the next day… Don’t let your dads eat pie!
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He did. Until.
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Maybe there should be warning labels on the boxes telling them not to put explosives on their head.
In front of his whole family.
Who will now get to be loudly reminded every year
Wait wait wait. Check his pulse
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I bet a witch cursed the fireworks
It's always sad when a firework fails to go off. You don't want to re-light it because that's extremely dangerous, but it's a waste of money to just soak it and be done.
Throw a Molotov on it from a safe distance like a *responsible* adult!
I'm telling you, Molotov cocktails work. Anytime I had a problem and I threw a Molotov cocktail, boom! Right away, I had a different problem.
JASON figured it out? Oh man, this one hurts.
You from Florida?
Thankfully no, that would be an automatic trip to the Bad Place.
The money was going up in smoke either way.
I will predict alcohol was involved
“Paige said Allen worked hard, played hard and ultimately died doing what he loved.” Being a dumbass.
It was a block party, too. Quite a few people witnessed it including children.
A teaching moment?
Lifelong trauma 🙃
Nope not a teachable moment, a “tachable moment” where they tried to reattach his head to his body.
Everyone has a purpose in life, but a concerning lot's purpose is to be an example of what not to do.
It feels like Loony Tunes logic. I wonder if some people think it’s like the cartoons or the TV shows and their face will blacken and their hair stand up and then in the next scene they will be back to normal again.
For some people, that's the pinnacle of their education.
He loved traumatizing his friends and family by blowing his head apart in front of them? Okaayyy
Yep. Here’s a better article: https://www.postandcourier.com/news/summerville-man-dead-fireworks-accident/article_62c98748-3ad3-11ef-8818-4763ccc875ed.html
> Paige [his wife] said Allen worked hard, played hard and ultimately died doing what he loved. Well, what more’s there to say than “he died doing what he loved”? 🤷♂️
Tbf if your grieving that friend who always did crazy things that ended up killing them like everyone told them it would. Its one comfort you have to balm the pain of losing them
He loved putting fireworks on his head? 🤨
You gotta set your aspirations reasonably low when you live in Summerville SC.
I was confused till I saw this comment. I would have also accepted Texas, Florida, anywhere in the south.
We really should have just let them leave back when we had the chance
Did you see the video in the article? It could not be more accurate to what I imagined on hearing this story.
he was the best at it, everyone said so.
I think that's code for, "My husband was a goofy dumbass that played too much, but boy did I have a nice life insurance policy."
“God calling him home” or “Trust God’s plan”
God looking down at this guy being born: I'm gonna make him blow his head off with a fire cracker. Random angel beside him: Jesus Christ man...
Jesus looks up from his gameboy: "Someone call my name?"
> “He was holding this firework over his top hat,” Paige later told The Post and Courier. It was one of those comically huge top hats too - there’s a video preview showing it in the article. Nobody knows what he was thinking but he probably figured it would protect him. Fireworks are entertaining and have lots of cool effects and nice looking colors, but they are still dangerous explosives.
> Allen told his son on the night of the incident that this Independence Day celebration would be their official father-son blowout to celebrate Hunter’s wedding day and his engagement. **Then he planned to stop drinking for a while.** > **“Alan was not a drinker,”** said Paige. “Everyone was drinking a little last night, but he didn’t drink regularly.” Seems like a slight contradiction?
Blowout was a bit of foreshadowing it seems.
The last paragraph of this article is brutal
This could almost pass as satire, they’ve included a video of him dancing in front of fireworks in a 4th of July themed suit and included that he told his son this would be their big father and son blowout to celebrate his upcoming wedding.
"He was living his best life last night." I mean, really!?!?
He looks exactly like a guy who would die that way.
The yearly tradition of reading this kind of story continues.
One of the shows on my local sports station used to due a bit after every 4th of July reading and mocking stories like these. They stopped a couple years ago because he felt like even though a lot of these people are doing very dumb things, it's still tragic.
Saw a tweet a few days ago where it said “many people out there don’t realize this is their last Wednesday with all of their fingers”
Maybe they need to do it the day before the 4th. Read last year’s. Might help someone remember *not* to put a firework on their head.
I always wonder what people say at funerals of these kind of deaths. “He…. was an idiot.”
“He died like he lived” is a tasteful way to say it.
I’m going to write that in my instructions so when my family struggles for something nice to say they can just throw that in and call it a day
"He died like he lived - stupidly"
“Marge, change the channel!”
TOOL wrote a song about it... called Eulogy.
>Details also confirm that bystanders attempted to stop the incident. I would hope so, but natural selection often finds a way..
My god, those poor people who saw it and couldn’t stop it. I am trying not to imagine it.
His poor wife saw it and told him to stop it and then it went off. She saw her husband's head explode right in front of her basically. A lot of people in this thread are just saying that he was an idiot (not wrong, well known fact that playing with fireworks is a no-no) and not thinking about much beyond that it seems. Say what you will about him, her, or whatever comes to mind when someone calls themselves/their spouse a "patriot" in 2024... That's the kind of thing you carry with you forever, you can't see your husband die in an instant and not be fucked up for life because of it. Your whole life, just changed forever in an instant. Losing my husband is my greatest fear. I hope she has lots of good support around her.
The smell
I scrolled past at least 3 trauma and ER docs on TikTok saying please keep your hands, genitals and overall bodies away from fireworks because they had indeed, seen it all.
My brother is an ER doc and has always maintained 4th of July is the worst holiday by far to have to work.
My brother is an emergency veterinary doctor. The 4th is the absolute worst and I straight up worry about him after.
My Dad's a retired pediatrician and he just went with "no fireworks".
Exploding devices are the thing I'd keep furthest from my head, but okay... Sounds like he died instantly (according to the other article linked in comments) and must have been pretty drunk, so he probably didn't feel a thing.
[удалено]
Did he say the most common last words of most Darwin award winners " Hey y'all watch this"?
I believe that every year, someone launches a mortar off their head and dies. How do people not know this is a bad idea by now? Like birthday candles and silly string or walking up on a pinata. Stop making the same mistakes!!!!
Fireworks are not toys. They are literally colorful packaged bombs.
I went to college with a guy missing 3 fingers from one hand after a July 4th accident. I made sure my kids got introduced to him at our reunion, they got the message.
"Kids, I'd like you to meet Bob. Shake Bob's hand, or what's left of it."
I knew a kid in high school that lost his right index finger forever because he held onto a mortar for too long at a house party. No fucking way in hell would I ever put an explosive strong enough to blow a persons hand off on top of my head.
For a nation so in-love with gunpowder and explosives, I find it fascinating how little understanding they have about either one.
You live, you learn. You love, you learn. You lose…. Oh wait he died.
iiiiiiii recommend lighting fireworks off your head to anyone, yeah.
Jagged little stump
The videos we see on the 5th of July are wilder every year. Evolution at work
Goddammit. There was literally a post on r/Disney about a Gaston character actor that died from doing this right before the 4th. Was that prophetic or is this just... common?
I was in that thread and people were talking about looking forward to seeing who hits the front page doing the same thing in the coming days lol
Welcome to South Carolina.
> Details also confirm that bystanders attempted to stop the incident. Bet there was some version of, "You guys are a bunch of pussies.. I know what I'm doing!" said before his head cratered and splattered.
If I had a nickel for every time a guy died *from putting a firework on his head*, I'd have two nickels. Which isn't a lot, but it's weird that it happened twice
Earlier today I read about a Disney employee who died this exact same way 9 years ago and now this, so yeah, 2 nickels https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/lifestyle/lifestyle-news/disney-world-gaston-actor-dead-806834/
“I spent 22 years keeping that boy safe.” Poor mom. She tried.
I felt that line very deeply too.
I remember this happened in maine a couple years back, so extra nickle for you if that wasn't the one you were recalling!
It also happened to a man here in the Seattle area. SMH https://www.kiro7.com/news/local/man-loses-life-redmond-fireworks-accident/WUQT7A3QT5GFVDNBUPDKRL4KDQ/
Third times a charm!
“I love the poorly educated”
Trump just lost a voter.
Gaston's sacrifice was in vain it seems.
This guy made it to 45. https://komonews.com/news/local/redmond-fireworks-accident-death-killed-man-bothell-hit-struck-head-avondale-road-cpr-washington-king-county-explosion-fourth-of-july-4th-parking-lot-detectives-police-officers-investigation He won't be doing this again.. only if he knew fireworks were illegal there.
I literally just read yesterday on Reddit how a former Disney employee did the same thing but I guess was a bit more worse. I was like damn “I wonder how many people are going to do something stupid today and end up dead due to fireworks” Now here I am reading this a day later
The older I get, the more of these stories I hear, it’s hard to have empathy when I read these stories. At this point I think you should need a license to buy and set off fireworks.
He died doing what he loved, being an idiot
Dumbass lights a firework on his head, news at 11
I wonder what society would be like if anytime someone gets hurt when alcohols involved, alcohol gets included in the headline to highlight its dangers.
Seeing this headline as a Floridian: "Please don't be Florida. Please don't be Florida. Please don't be Florida." Clicks link: "'SUMMERVILLE, S.C.' Oh thank God."
So he basically put a mini bomb on top of his head and lit the fuse. Sad sorry dumb way to go.
Got himself a Darwin Award
Darwin awards front runner.
The truly stupid people don’t make old age.
What’s the last thing a redneck ever says? “Hey everyone! Watch this!”
After stating he deliberately lit the device and placed it on his head they called it an accident. Someone needs to buy the copy editor a dictionary.