A 13-year-old boy was told his foot could have been amputated after a vape pen became impaled in it.
Harley Bennett was out with friends when he found a discarded Elf Bar vape pen on the ground underneath a subway. The teenager stood the vape up and stamped on it in an attempt to crush it 'like a Coke can'.
But the disposable e-cigarette didn't smash, and instead pierced straight through his trainer, his sock and into his skin. Harley's mum Samantha Robinson rushed to the scene after her son's friend called her.
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She took Harley to hospital, where he was hooked up to an antibiotic drip and given painkillers. He then had to undergo a two-hour operation and skin graft surgery.
He was discharged six hours after the surgery but Samantha said that during a follow-up appointment, a surgeon told her there was a high possibility that Harley could lose his foot as a result of infection in his cracked heel bone. Now, the family have spoken out about Harley's ordeal to raise awareness about the importance of disposing vapes correctly.
Harley said: "I wasn't thinking, I don't know how to explain it. I just stamped on it and it just went straight into my foot. It was very painful.
"The recovery process was very stressful. The moment where the doctor told me I could lose my foot was very, very stressful. The pain is much better now."
Samantha, 34, said: "It was really shocking. I felt sick, scared, I didn't know what was going on.
"The hospital hadn't come into contact with anything like this before. It was the first they'd seen of it.
"It must have been very shocking for them as well. I had all the nurses asking to look at the pictures I had because they were so gobsmacked.
"The size and width of the puff bar went the majority of the way in, and jammed into the top of the heel bone, which cracked it. It was a clean cut of flesh gone."
Samantha added: "Harley was actually quite calm, probably because the adrenaline kicked in and he wasn't feeling anything. Two weeks after it happened, the surgeon said there's a high chance of infection and a high chance you might lose your foot.
"That was what scared me the most. I felt terrified and sick. I was more scared for Harley and of his reaction and how he was being than of my own.
"Seeing how scared he was - and he wasn't sleeping - [meant that] it was more about trying to concentrate on how he was feeling."
For the following nine weeks, Samantha had to change and clean her son's bandages daily, taking Harley into hospital every few days to have the wound checked. Although Harley is now on the road to recovery, Samantha claims that the failed skin graft will likely leave a small dip in the teen's foot for life.
Photos of the injury were shared online by Harley's grandmother Andrea Keen, 56, in an attempt to raise awareness about the importance of disposing vapes correctly. Andrea said: "He [Harley] was wearing £200 shoes which have a really thick sole on them. It went right through that, right through a sock, right through his flesh, up to the bone. That's quite shocking.
"If someone was running around with bare feet, that could go right through [the foot]. People have got to learn to dispose of vapes properly.
"It's been nine weeks, and you can imagine that after being told he could lose his foot - it was awful. He's only 13."
ELFBAR have been contacted for a comment.
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