Woman Left Blind in One Eye After Pressure Cooker Whistle Reportedly Explodes into Skull
An Indian woman was blinded in one eye after having an explosive interaction with her pressure cooker.
Munda Birsi, 57, was making a pot of dal in her home on Sept. 4, 2019. She left the pressure cooker on her gas stove and decided to utilize the idle time to cut hay in her backyard, according to SWNS.
Because she was in the backyard working, she didn’t hear the whistle indicating that the heat needed to be reduced, which would later prove to be a grave mistake.
After an hour of cutting hay, Birsi walked back inside and removed the pot from her stove. As she did so, the whistle from the top of the pot exploded from the built-up pressure and lodged into her face.
The 3-inch object reportedly pierced “the skull bone separating her eyes from her brain.”
She was rushed to the Bhagwan Mahavir Medica Super Specialty Hospital in Jharkhand, India, where doctors needed to conduct a CT scan in order to see the full object.
Thanks to the quick-thinking of Dr. Ashish Joy Soren and other staff members, Birsi was able to survive the horrific incident. She did, however, lose her eye.
Dr. Soren told SWNS that surgery was complicated because if they pulled the whistle out with too much force, it would have damaged the surrounding tissue.
Ultimately he and his team gently pulled the whistle out and covered the wound with gauze.
“Firstly we had to release adhesions around the whistle and ensure that no bleeding should occur while extricating the metallic object,” he said.
“We had kept backup plans if blood would spurt.”
Birsi was released from the hospital the day after her operation.
Although the potential risks of pressure cookers deter people from using them at home, Food Network star Alton Brown claims that he uses a pressure cooker “on an almost daily basis,” according to Men’s Journal.
“All modern pots come with pressure locks that prevent accidental opening and explosive depressurization,” Brown assured in a video on Food Network’s website.
While it isn’t clear what kind of pressure cooker Birsi was using at the time of the tragic accident, modern pressure cookers, like the Instant Pot, have safety features that help prevent explosive events.
If you have a pressure cooker, or are considering purchasing one, carefully review the manual to ensure that you know how to control the pressure to avoid an accident like Birsi’s.
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