7-Year-Old Girl Loses Eye After Vape Battery Acid Explodes During Bonfire Incident

A young schoolgirl has lost an eye after a vape reportedly “exploded in her face,” leaving her skin covered in battery acid.

Ruby Grainger had just purchased an ice cream from a van parked near her home in the Tallaght suburb of Dublin when the incident occurred.

The seven-year-old was walking past a bonfire lit by local youths when a battery in the flames exploded, sending shards of the vape into her face.

Her mother Ciara, 32, told the Irish Mirror: ‘She was walking across to the van and when she was coming back bang, something exploded in her face.

‘All I hear is screaming, she was hysterical, when she got to the house I could have collapsed.

‘The blood was rushing all down her face, I put her to my chest and rang the ambulance, I was frantic.’

Ruby was quickly taken to the hospital by ambulance, and that same night she was transferred to the Royal Victoria Eye and Ear Hospital.

Her family was informed that doctors performed an emergency operation on October 5, during which they had to remove her eye.

‘Doctors said that this is the first case of this kind of damage from a fire, they have seen explosions but to lose her whole eye, the socket, everything,’ Ciara said.

‘I do not think it has properly hit me that the child has no eye now. For a split second her whole life changed, and mine too, when she lost her eye I lost mine.

‘If I could give her mine I would. I would give everything for her, she is only seven, and this never should have happened to her. I cannot believe it.’

The mother-of-four said doctors believe the damage was caused by battery acid as ‘the eyeball was like mashed potato’.

Ruby reports that she didn’t feel anything hit her eye, and doctors indicate that the type of damage she sustained wouldn’t result from a physical object.

Following the incident, a family member investigated the area around the fire and found remnants of several burnt-out vapes.

A fundraiser has been established to help Ruby obtain a prosthetic eye, and doctors are hopeful that her eye socket will heal sufficiently in six weeks to allow for the operation.

Additionally, doctors have advised that she will need to transfer to a specialized school for visually impaired children.

Her mother said: ‘Ruby will also never be able to go to play like she used to, Ruby also has to learn to balance again due to having a blind side, and the biggest one is Ruby is no longer able to see out of her right eye.’