06:14 PM PDT on Tuesday, July 24, 2007
PUYALLUP, Wash. – A Puyallup teenager says he feels fine now, but a few weeks ago he had an extremely close call with a sharp javelin.
Kyler Osborne has been competing in Junior Olympics and other track and field events for seven years. His room is full of ribbons and medals, and one of this 14-year-old's favorites is throwing the javelin.
What makes the javelin travel the distance is that it does is that fact that it's pointed on both ends.
Kyler's dad recorded video of some his throws before the accident.
"My steps were off and I was frustrated, so I threw it in the ground in front of me and my momentum kind of carried me into it. It happened so fast," said Kyler. "I came back off of it and I lifted up my shirt and saw there was a pretty good-size hole."
It didn't seem that bad at first.
"I lifted up his shirt and saw the hole, and it wasn't bleeding hardly at all," said his dad, Gary Osborne.
Thinking it was just a 2- or 3-inch puncture wound, dad immediately drove Kyler to the hospital in Puyallup.
"At first it didn't hurt too much till I got to the hospital, and once I got there the pain started to take over. I could really feel it then," said Kyler.
Doctors took a CAT scan and X-rays and knew the javelin went through more than a few inches puncturing a small hole in part of his liver, nicking a lung, but missing his heart, gallbladder, and at least three major arteries.
"Those arteries, if they had been hit would have been very dangerous. It would have taken a long time to heal," said his mom, Karrie Osborne. "Or it could have killed him right on the field within minutes."
Still, it wasn't clear to doctors that the javelin had gone all the way through his body.
"It was 07/07/07, so it was really my lucky and unlucky day, all at once," said Kyler.
He'll have to take it easy for at least a few more weeks, but Kyler says he'll be back to throwing the javelin again.
Kyler was just a few weeks away from competing in the regional Junior Olympics, with hopes of going to the Nationals.