The 18-year-old should have died within minutes after the projectile pierced his pancreas and abdominal aorta. The shard did not go all the way through him but did push the skin on his back about two inches out.

The freak accident happened Tuesday afternoon when his 20-year-old brother was cutting the lawn at his family?EUR??,,????'???s house with a push lawn mower. A doctor told Collins?EUR??,,????'??? father that the metal went into the artery but also helped seal off the wound to keep him from bleeding to death.

Doctors at Halifax Medical Center in Daytona Beach removed the 10-inch piece of metal and placed Matt Collins in the intensive surgical care unit, where they kept him in a drug-induced coma Thursday in serious but stable condition.
Nearly 80,000 Americans a year require medical treatment because of lawn-mower injuries, according to a study by the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. But experts say getting impaled by a projectile from a lawn mower is rare.

Nails and wire are the most common objects that turn into projectiles, said Patty Davis, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, a federal agency.

Thirty percent of injuries that come from use of a walk-behind power lawn mower come from blade contact, Davis said. Only 16 percent come from thrown objects.

People should make a habit of looking for any debris that might be on their lawns before they start to mow, she said.
There were about 48,700 injuries in emergency rooms related to walk-behind mowers from 2003 to 2005, according to the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission.

Objects that get stuck by the blade of a lawn mower can become projectiles that can travel up to 200 mph, according to a study on lawn-mower safety by the University of Iowa.

Gary Collins, a construction foreman, said he feels fortunate. ?EUR??,,????'??He ain?EUR??,,????'???t out of the woods yet,?EUR??,,????'?? he said of his son, ?EUR??,,????'??but he?EUR??,,????'???s doing fine.?EUR??,,????'??

Editors Note: You may have heard recently in the news about the tragic death of Steve Irwin, ?EUR??,,????'??Crocodile Hunter.?EUR??,,????'?? Caught on film was Irwin swimming above a stingray as it lashed out and speared him in the heart with its barbed tail. His next attempt to save his life was by ripping the impalement from his chest, which according to experts would cause more bleeding and tissue damage. Leaving the impalement inside of the body would stem the bleeding and plug up the hole as in the case of Matt Collins. It is important to note when facing injuries of this magnitude not to panic and try to remove the object of impalement because it may be sealing off the wound itself.