Claim:   Photograph shows a motorcycle accident victim impaled by a wooden post.

Status:   Undetermined.

Example:   [Collected via e-mail, 2004]

OUCH: READ THIS STORY THEN LOOK AT THE PICTURE!!!!!!!! Below is an actual emergency room photo of a gentleman who lost control of his motorcycle on a country road in West Virginia. Troopers believe that he was traveling at a speed of approximately 75 mph at the time of the accident. He was unable to negotiate a curve in the road. Unfortunately for him, upon striking the ditch and being ejected from the bike, he landed back end first on a fencepost from an old barnyard fenced that was downed on the side of the road. You can probably picture what happened next, but the attached picture really says it all. The good news is that after about 6 months, this man made a full recovery after suffering a shattered hip, broken leg, several broken ribs, internal injuries and "soft tissue" damage. Doctors credited his recovery to the fact that the post lodged itself so tightly that there was little or no blood loss.

Origins:   The photograph referenced by the above text (which can be found on various sites around the web by searching on phrases such as "gentleman who lost control of his motorcycle") is evidently genuine, although the explanation that now accompanies it is possibly an invented one. This picture first began circulating in March 2004 under the title "Lesson Painfully Learned" and at that time bore no text to explain its putative origins; the motorcycle accident scenario quoted above did not begin to circulate with the photographs until many months later.

Back in 2004 an informant told us that the photograph originated in the trauma bay of the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences' (UAMS) emergency room. According to this source, the patient shown in the photo crashed his truck through a fence, causing a large fence post to come through part of the truck's engine and firewall before catching on spring wire in the back of the front seat, impaling the driver in the process. The patient was reportedly treated in the operating room but died a few days later of infection. We have not been able to independently verify these details, however.

In early 2006, the photo was circulated with this as its accompanying text:

This is an actual emergency room photo of a fisherman who lost control of his high-speed bass boat in West Virginia.

Warden's believe that he was traveling at a speed of approximately 75 mph at the time of the accident. He was unable to negotiate a curve in the narrow waterway. Unfortunately for him, upon striking the shoreline and being ejected from the boat he landed back end first on an old fence post.

You can probably picture what happened next, but the attached picture really says it all. The good news is that after about 6 months, this man made a full recovery after suffering a shattered hip, broken leg, several broken ribs, internal injuries and soft tissue damage.

Doctors credited his recovery to the fact that the post lodged itself so tightly that there was little or no blood loss.

NOW THAT'S GOTTA HURT!!!!!!"

Last updated:   2 March 2006

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