A New Jersey family’s vacation turned tragic when a shard of a badminton racquet broke off and pierced their six-year-old daughter’s skull, killing her.
Lucy Morgan died on Wednesday, The New York Post reports, four days after the shocking freak accident on what was supposed to be an idyllic lakeside trip in the US state of Maine.
The tragedy unfolded last Saturday as the family of six enjoyed their last full day at their rental cottage in Limerick, Maine, according to her father Jesse Morgan, a pastor at Green Pond Bible Chapel in Rockaway.
“We were eating a quick lunch by the lake and the kids decided to try badminton in the front yard. Bethany and I were relaxing in the back when we heard screaming,” Mr Morgan wrote in a blog entry titled “Calamity Strikes”.
“Due to a freak accident with a racquet that broke on a downward swing, a sharp piece had entered Lucy’s skull while she was sitting on the sideline and caused catastrophic injury.”
Lucy was breathing, but unresponsive as emergency services rushed her to a local hospital, which then airlifted her to Maine Medical Centre in Portland, according to Maine State Police.
She was taken directly into the operating room, where surgeons removed part of her skull to relieve pressure, when Lucy flatlined on the table.
While doctors were successful in reviving the young girl, Lucy had lost all brain function and the full ability to breathe on her own.
Doctors warned the family the little girl had “a very slim chance” of recovery because the penetration of the racquet shaft was very deep into her brain and had caused immediate arterial bleeds, Mr Morgan explained.
The little girl succumbed to her injuries around 4am on Wednesday, one day after she was predicted to die.
“Every time I looked into the rearview mirror, wishing I saw Lucy munching on some chicken nuggets after we stopped at Wendy’s and only ordered for 5,” Mr Morgan wrote about making the long, 350-mile (563km) drive back to their New Jersey home without Lucy.
According to Mr Morgan, Lucy’s siblings Silas, 10, Shiloh, 8, and Atticus, 4, are struggling to comprehend the loss and are tragically “blaming themselves and taking it hard”.
Maine State Police determined Lucy had been playing with her 10-year-old brother when the aluminium shaft of the racquet dislodged from its wooden handle, causing the shaft to strike the girl in the head and pierce through her skull.
This article originally appeared on The New York Post and was reproduced with permission
