Flame on: more dangerous than the Galaxy Note 7?

Technological advances have created new ways by which smoking can ruin your health:

A Manhattan wine shop worker got burned when an e-cigarette in his pocket exploded — and surveillance cameras caught it all on video.

In truly alarming video posted by ABC News, Otis Gooding can be seen standing and speaking with coworkers just before the e-cigarette exploded in a fireball that sent sparks and flames shooting in all directions.

Gooding was working at Central Cellars — a wine shop in Manhattan’s Grand Central Station — when the explosion took place. His coworkers scattered as Gooding frantically tried to pat out the flames, receiving serious burns to his right hand.

Attorney Sanford Rubenstein said that Gooding was rushed to a nearby hospital and was admitted to the burn unit, where he will undergo surgeries to repair burn damage to his skin.

The injuries to Gooding were extensive:

Gruesome new photos show the extensive injuries suffered by Otis Gooding when an e-cigarette exploded in his pocket at a Grand Central Terminal wine store Wednesday.

A large swath of skin on Gooding’s right thigh is completely melted away, exposing the raw and shiny pink membrane underneath.

More badly scorched skin covers his right palm and trails up his index finger, evidence of Gooding’s desperate attempt to pat down the fire that erupted with a barrage of mini explosions in his right trouser leg.

Still more photos show the patches of skin charred to a crisp, apparently before doctors at New York-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center’s burn unit had a chance to clean the painful wounds.

But hey, we should be deregulating everything, because safety rules hold back commerce. Riiiight…

By: dave-dr-gonzo

David Hirsch, a.k.a. Dave "Doctor" Gonzo*, is a renegade record producer, video producer, writer, reformed corporate shill, and still-registered lobbyist for non-one-percenter performing artists and musicians. He lives in a heavily fortified compound in one of Manhattan's less trendy neighborhoods.

* Hirsch is the third person to use the pseudonym, a not-so-veiled tribute to journalist and author Hunter S. Thompson, with the permission of his predecessors Gene Gaudette of American Politics Journal (currently webmaster and chief bottlewasher at Liberaland) and Stephen Meese at Smashmouth Politics.