This story contains graphic content.
A victim of extreme weather in Argentina just got a leg up on the new year in one of the worst ways imaginable.
Ignacio Mascarenhas was on holiday last week with his girlfriend, Mailen, at Mar del Plata in Buenos Aires Province when he suffered an anguishing freak accident after strong winds caused a gigantic metal umbrella pole to spear his leg during a storm. Rescue workers had to use a hydraulic cutter to saw through the dense projectile, which was wedged next to the man’s femur, Central European News reported.
Despite the grotesque injury and incalculable pain, however, hardly any blood was lost in what doctors called the “best point where” someone’s thigh could be impaled.
“It was like a spear. The pain was unbearable,” said the 31-year-old vacationer, who went from celebrating his and his girlfriend’s one-year anniversary to writhing in pain at a local ER — on Christmas Eve, no less.
Port workers attended to his injury with first aid as they waited for emergency services. Meanwhile, a nearby surfer stopped to help Mascarenhas remove the upper section of the umbrella so that just the pole remained.
Never complain about a seagull stealing your fries again. A man was impaled by a beach umbrella in Argentina on Christmas Eve. CENIt took firefighters a half-hour to a secure the specialized machinery needed to saw through the harpoon-like object just enough so he could fit inside an ambulance. All the while, Mascarenhas said, the storm and winds raged on as sparks from the buzz saw flew to the sand during the agonizing and lengthy rescue.
After fire crews successfully hacked off a chunk of the iron skewer, they rushed the man to the Hospital Interzonal General de Agudos, where a veritable Christmas miracle occurred.
Rescue workers had to hack off a chunk of umbrella pole before rushing the victim to a local hospital. CEN
Despite the harrowing injury, doctors say the situation could have ended fatally. CEN“They put me to sleep, operated on me and removed the iron pole. When they took it out, they told me it did not touch any tendons, nerves, veins, or arteries.”
Doctors said that if the pole struck five centimeters higher in his femoral artery, Mascarenhas may have not lived to see 2022.
“When they removed the pole, I did not bleed,” he told CEN. “They told family members that it was the best point where it could have entered.”
Ignacio Mascarenhas, (left) with his brother Pablo (right), after the surgery that removed the offending umbrella pole. CEN