A New Jersey family’s vacation turned tragic when a shard from a badminton racket shattered and pierced their 6-year-old daughter’s skull, killing her.
Little Lucy Morgan died Wednesday, four days after the shocking and freak accident during what was supposed to be an idyllic trip to a lake in Maine.
The tragedy unfolded Saturday as the Morgan family of six was enjoying their last full day at their rental cabin in Limerick, Maine, according to their father Jesse Morgan, pastor at Green Pond Bible Chapel in Rockaway.
“We were eating a quick lunch by the lake and the kids decided to try badminton in the front yard. Bethany and I were relaxing in the back when we heard screaming,” Morgan wrote in a blog post titled “Calamity Strikes.”
“Due to a freak accident with a racket breaking during a downward swing, a sharp piece entered Lucy’s skull while she was sitting on the sidelines and caused catastrophic injuries .”
According to Maine State Police, she was “unintentionally injured by her 10-year-old brother.”
The racket’s aluminum handle had separated from its wooden handle, causing the handle to hit the girl in the head, judges ruled.
Lucy was breathing but unresponsive as EMS rushed her to a local hospital, which airlifted the injured girl to Maine Medical Center in Portland, according to state police from Maine.
She was taken straight to the operating room, where surgeons removed part of her skull to relieve pressure, when Lucy crashed onto the table.
Fortunately, doctors were able to resuscitate the girl, but Lucy had lost all her brain functions and all her ability to breathe on her own.
Doctors warned the family that the little girl had “a very low chance” of recovery – the penetration of the racket handle was very deep into her brain and caused immediate arterial bleeding, Morgan said.
The little girl succumbed to her injuries around 4 a.m. Wednesday, a day after her death was announced.
“Every time I looked in the rearview mirror, I wished I had seen Lucy snacking on chicken nuggets after we stopped at Wendy’s and ordered only 5,” Morgan wrote of the long 350-mile drive to their home in New Jersey without Lucy.
According to Morgan, Lucy’s siblings Silas, 10, Shiloh, 8, and Atticus, 4, struggle to understand the loss and tragically blame each other and take it hard.
The brother who accidentally caused the fatal injury asked his grieving parents “how could we ever be happy again,” according to his father’s blog.
“We sat on the front steps for a while, crying, until I finally found the courage to open the door. We collapsed in a heap on the kitchen floor again, crying harder than ever as a family,” Morgan wrote.
His funeral will take place on June 15 at his father’s church.