I meant to say. What happened in the accident? Should I not have a
fire
extinguisher in my car? It seems, that the woman was lucky that she was
not
killed.


Here is the original story:
================================
Just a few of the main points, but, wife and I made a trip to town
Sunday afternoon to
do some shopping, on return from town, we spotted a fire extinguisher
5# dry chemical type along the roadside, stopped and I went back to
retreive it. It looked in
good condition, so I carried it back to the truck. I got in the
truck, set the extinguisher on my lap to have a better look at it,
and just like that the thing came all apart. I came out on the better
end of the deal with a few teeth knocked out, a hairline fracture of
the upper jaw bone and nose, and cheek, and all my teeth on the upper
left left dangling in the sockets, once I regained my composure I
started to call for the wife, as I could not see as my eyes were
loaded with the dry chemical, and breathing was extremely difficult,
I finally managed to see somewhat, and my wife had a large gaping
hole in the left side of her head, and was bleeding very profusly.
Tried to flag down another vehicle for help, but no one would stop.
I eventually got her situated in the cab of the truck and drove wide
assed open with the throttle limiter constantly kicking on and off
(its factory set at 100mph top), barely able to see out the side
window with my head out, as the entire inside of the truck was still
a white out and covered completely in the dry chemical. I made it to
the hospital where she was examined and then imediately transferred
to another hospital and underwent close to 3 hours of surgery to
remove broken skull fragments that penetrated the lining of the brain
and some parts of the brain. She never did loose consicouness, but
had problems moving her arm and fingers and certain other reflexes
were not working. Things were very gloomy Sunday night, and not
looking
none to good. Surgery went well, and on Monday they had her
setting up and eating, and no signs of any paralysyis or damages
seem to be of any permanent degree, as her functions are returning
pretty darn quick. She has spend a couple of days in ICU, and now is
in a private room, and the surgeon thinks she may be able to come home
by the weekend.
The Surgeon said a brain if not damaged bad or
depending on the area is a very quick organ to rebound. It has no
nerves in it, and as long as they can keep infection away and any
hemorageing or pressures buildup away she should recopver just fine.
There will be a gap in her skull from pieces of bone that was too
badly damaged to be replaced, so she is going to have to wait until
this is all healed, and no signs of infection, before they would go
back in and install a plate over the hole that is left. The remaining
hole is about
20mm x 34mm in size accoprding to the Surgeon, but if the wife feels
ok
its not absolutely necessary to have it covered over. He said lots of
folks have opening as such, and its a common practice and procedure.
Else it will have to be watched for how fast it grows, and a plate
will be installed later down the road. So as of today, things are just
fine, she has sight and balance problems, but they should go away,
once the swelling goes down.

The fire extinguisher has been checked over and they have come up with
a theory anyhow as to what happened. Just be leary if you find a
fire extiinguuisher or any prressure vessel whose history you do not
know anything about. It may be best to let it be and call the
authorities. This extinguisher appeared to be in perfect condition
except for some scratches, the gage was not even broken, but the
impact when it fell from whatever vehicle probably broke loose the
valve to cylinder connection, and it worked its way loose. My handling
all aided it in finally allowing ther valve to blow out. All I did was
pick it up and carry iot back to the pickup, and lay it in my lap and
looked at it, and attempted to roll it over to see the label on it,
when it let loose. All appeared just fine with the extinguisher when I
first picked it up.

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