A 32 year-old mother-of-two has warned of the terrifying dangers of vapes, after she was left scarred for life when her rechargable e-cigarette exploded in her lap and set her car on fire.
Suzanne Manus had been driving back to her house after a shopping trip when her device, resting in between her thighs, blew up without warning in November last year.
Her husband Bobby had been on the phone to her at the time, and heard the ‘boom’ of the explosion.
His wife declared she was ‘on fire’ before line went dead, leaving him fearing for her life.
Ms Manus, from Alabama in the US, said when her legs caught fire, she pulled over on they motorway and jumped out her car before removing her trousers at the side of the road.
She waited for an ambulance to arrive and watched as her Nissan Rogue Sport car turned into a ‘fireball’.
She was then rushed to Flowers Hospital in Dothan, Alabama, before being airlifted to the trauma centre at UAB Hospital in Birmingham, Alabama.
Doctors informed her she had suffered extensive burns on her inner thighs, her genitals and bottom.
Suzanne Manus is warning vape addicts to ditch their devices after her’s triggered a mass explosion in her car, which has left her scarred for life.
She was airlifted to a trauma centre where medics performed urgent sugery to attempt to repair her wounds.
The stay-at-home-mum and carer then had to undergo two surgeries including a skin graft to help heal her wounds.
‘I was just driving down the road talking to my husband and then the next thing you know, my vape just exploded,’ she said.
‘It was in my lap and it exploded and I had an immediate reaction.
‘The explosion scared me and my husband could hear me as he was on Bluetooth in my car.
‘He thought I was dead for about 45 seconds. Immediately, my foot pressed the accelerator. I was swerving all over the road. I looked down and saw I was on fire and in that moment I thought I was going to die.’
After being rushed to the Acute Trauma Care Unit at UAB Hospital, Suzanne went in to surgery to have her dead skin scraped off.
She then underwent a skin graft surgery 10 days later in which doctors transferred healthy skin from her left thigh to help repair the burnt tissue.
Ms Manus said: ‘For the first couple of days, it felt like I was still on fire. I was burning and they had to scrape and clean my skin.
‘When I looked at my legs after the first surgery, I couldn’t see how they could get better. It looked so bad and it looked like a zombie had attacked me.
‘I thought I’d be left scarred for life at this point as I didn’t know what to expect after my next surgery.’
Ms Manus said she was an ‘avid’ vaper before the accident, and now doesn’t want to be around the devices.
NHS Digital data, based on the smoking, drinking and drug use among young people in England survey for the year 2021, showed 30 per cent of children in Yorkshire and the Humber have used a vape
She spent a month in hospital recovering from the accident before being discharged and sent home.
While she claims her wounds are healing well, she is still dealing with the mental and emotional repercussions of the fire.
‘My injuries are getting better. I have to put lotion and Vaseline on these areas four or five times a day.
‘The leg where the donor site will be scarred for life and it takes about two years for the graft to settle.
‘Right now they look crazy and are purple and prominent but they are healing.
‘The physical pain was agonising but the mental and emotional effects have been much worse. I do not vape anymore and I don’t want to be around a vape.’
Before the accident, Ms Manus was an ‘avid’ vaper.
‘I was always very meticulous and careful with my vape and I had heard stories about them exploding but usually it was because they had put them in the pocket or purse,’ she said.
Matthew Burton is another victim of an exploding vape. The 37-year-old was strapping his son into the family car when he started to feel a warm sensation
Mr Burton’s injuries were initially compared to ‘sunburn’ but it was revealed he had second-degree burns and was lucky his wounds didn’t become infected
‘I always made sure the batteries from my vape were not peeling or old. I bought new batteries every two to four months.
‘I would like to tell people not to vape. I know people think it’s a better alternative to smoking cigarettes but it is completely not worth it.
‘They do blow and it can change your life forever. This could have been my fate. I could not be here if I had got stuck in my car.’
In June 2023, logistics manager Matthew Burton, from Warwick, suffered second degree burns when the vape he was carrying in his pocket exploded.
The father-of-two had just finished strapping his six-year-old son into the family car when he suddenly felt increasingly intense heat from the pocket of his jeans, before the device ignited.
After stripping off his trousers, the logistics manager drove straight to hospital and showed nurses what had happened to his left leg.
There, staff cleaned the dead skin out with a scalpel and used saline to clean the wound.
But Mr Burton said he was discharged without the wound being dressed after a doctor compared his burns to ‘sunburn’.
Mr Burton has now been referred to a burns specialist by his horrified GP surgery, where a nurse said he was lucky the wound had not become infected.
The logistics manager said he wanted to speak about his ordeal to warn others of the dangers posed by vapes — and said that would be the last time he used devices.
