Arizona Woman Speaks Out About Exploding Vaporizer Incident

A woman in Arizona is speaking out about the time her vaporizer exploded in her lap while she was driving, forcing her to jump out of the vehicle while it was still in motion.

The woman, Melissa Madsen, who was 20-years-old at the time of the alleged incident, suffered third-degree burns on 6 percent of her body as well as two broken hips and a road rash on her arms and back. As a result of the injuries she sustained in the incident, which occurred in 2017, she will reportedly have to undergo surgery to remove three screws that doctors placed in her pelvis if she ever intends on giving birth to a newborn child. She has, thus far, undergone a total of eight surgeries over the course of her recovery effort.

The vehicle that she leaped from during the incident, a pickup truck, crashed into a tree after she exited it.

As for why she was vaping, she was quoted by Fox 10 Phoenix as having said that “bought a vaporizer” because she, like others, was “under the impression that it’s a safer way to quit smoking cigarettes,” but then there she was – “in a hospital bed.”

“People buy vapes in order to quit smoking cigarettes, under the impression that it’s a safer way to quit smoking cigarettes (…) That’s exactly why I bought a vaporizer, and yet there I was, in the hospital bed.”

Unfortunately, Madsen’s exploding vaporizer isn’t the only recorded incident of an exploding vape that has left someone injured. In fact, such incidents of exploding vapes are actually on the rise in the United States, according to official government data from the U.S. Fire Administration and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

To learn more about exploding vaporizers and e-cigs, read this guide.