This Fourth of July holiday was a busy one for the Orion Township Fire Department, who responded to two calls of fireworks-related injuries resulting in partial-finger amputations on Friday.
The fire department and Oakland County Sheriff’s Department responded to a call at 6:15 p.m. on Pine Tree Road for a fireworks-related injury involving two men. According to an OCSD report, a homeowner on Pine Tree had called 911 after waving two men in to his property, after they were injured while lighting fireworks on a boat on Lake Orion.
OCSD deputies and rescue workers were escorted by onlookers to a beach area behind the residence, where one of the men was lying down. The other man involved in the accident was standing next to him, and the OCSD reported that both appeared injured, with the one lying down having a partial amputation of the fingers of his left hand.
Both of the men were in a boat a couple of hundred feet off shore, lighting fireworks and putting them in plastic bottles before throwing them out into the water. The OCSD reported that one of the men had lit a large, “dynamite-style” firecracker, put it in a bottle, and attempted to throw it overboard when it exploded as he let it go.
The Pine Tree homeowner said he heard the explosion and waved the men in as he called for help. Both men were taken to POH Medical Center, where one of the men was treated and released, while the other was transferred to William Beaumont Hospital in Royal Oak, with severe injuries to his hand and upper body and face. Neither man was identified in the OCSD report.
In another incident on Heights Road, a 20-year-old Oxford man was taken to the hospital for an amputation of the fingers of his right hand due to fireworks.
According to the OCSD report, fire department personnel were called to the home, where they found the man sitting on a chair on the balcony, with a severe hand injury and many of his right-hand fingers gone.
The OCSD reported a strong odor of intoxicants from other people present, also under the legal age of consumption, as well as the Oxford man. Initially the man told the OSCD that he had cut himself on glass, then said he’d ignited a firecracker that had gone off in his hand. The man said he had been drinking on a boat owned by a friend.
A 19-year-old Lake Orion man confirmed the account, saying the firecracker had gone off too quickly and caused injury to the man’s hand. Other witnesses denied seeing the incident.
The Oxford man was transferred to the hospital for treatment.