Blog Report

Monday, July 21, 2008

15 Year-Old Dead After Huffing Refrigerant

From WREG in Memphis, Today’s THV 11 in Little Rock, and the Log Cabin Democrat in Conway, Arkansas:

Last Wednesday, a 15- year-old Arkansas boy was killed after he “huffed refrigerant from an air conditioner and got into a swimming pool.”

“According to a police report, the sister of one of the victims "looked outside the window and saw her brother floating in the pool and he was foaming from the mouth. She also stated she saw the other victim in the pool with a garbage bag over his head but he was above the water. She ran outside screaming at them and got no response, pulled them from the pool and called 911."

Her brother was pronounced dead at the hospital after “EMTs and emergency room personnel had attempted to revive him for about an hour.”

The second boy was found “breathing, but disoriented.” He was treated and released from the hospital. The bag that had covered his head tested positive for refrigerant. The County Coroner learned from the surviving boy what had happened. “The boys contrived a means of channeling refrigerant from the outside air conditioner unit into a 30-gallon trash bag, then got into the pool and took turns inhaling from the bag.” He further explained that they had leaned how to get the refrigerant out of the air conditioner from a peer and that they had “filled the 30-gallon bag five or six times.”

The Coroner also noted that inhalant abuse is “prevalent among teens, especially those between the ages of 12 to 14” and that “teens who abuse inhalants likely do not understand the dangers involved.”

The state medical examiner cautioned that this “was the second drowning he had seen involving huffing” and he suspects “there are also falls associated with huffing deaths.”

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