Texas man William Brown dies after e-cigarette explodes in mouth, riddling his face and neck with shrapnel
- William Brown’s carotid artery was severed by pieces of the exploding e-cigarette
- ‘It looked like someone had shot him,’ his grandmother said
William Brown had errands to run on a chilly Texas evening, and his grandmother was happy to lend him her car.
Brown stopped at a store selling e-cigarettes outside Fort Worth on January 27. He sat alone in the parked car, put his lips to the device, and soon after, an explosion sent shards of metal into his face and neck, said Alice Brown, his grandmother.
He thrashed and fell out of the car, trying to regain his balance on the bonnet and boot before collapsing, she said, according to evidence from the scene conveyed to her by authorities.
Brown, 24, held on for two days before he died at a hospital. The cause of death was listed as stroke after the carotid artery in his neck was severed by “penetrating trauma from exploding vaporiser pen”, the Tarrant County medical examiner found.
William was the third generation of electricians in the family, said his father, Steve Brown, and they worked side by side.
“He was a real sweet kid,” Brown told The Washington Post on Tuesday, about two weeks shy of his son’s birthday. “Before now I haven’t gone two days without talking to him in 25 years.”