California woman, 18, is disfigured in freak accident involving s'mores on a tabletop firepit
Viana Poggi, 18, was enjoying a fun summer night on July 6 with her cousin Alaina Arbiso when chaos unfolded before their eyes.
While using a cement tabletop firepit, flames suddenly blew toward Poggi, leaving her with blistering burns on her face and arms.
Her cousin Arbiso said all she could remember was how fast everything happened in that terrifying moment, before she pushed her relative into a nearby pool.
Arbiso said: 'Within, like, a millisecond, you don't even see it coming - you have no time to react. It just happened.'
After pushing Poggi into the water, Arbiso then grabbed a hose and sprayed down the flames spreading on the table.
Another family member was also hit by the dangerous flames, but only Poggi was severely injured.
When she got to a local burns center, staff asked Poggi about what was used to fuel the firepit.
Poggi said: 'Even when I got to the ER, I just said I got hit by fire, and they asked me, "Was it rubbing alcohol?" Because it's so common for people to be burned that way.'
A friend of hers Alexandra Welsh, who's a trauma nurse in the emergency room, was shocked after seeing someone she knew arrive with such intense injuries.
Welsh said: 'I work at a trauma center, so I see a lot of traumatic injuries come in, but it is so different when it is someone who you think of as a little sister.'
Despite the freak accident impacting her life, Poggi, who's been left with scars and burn marks, decided to make the best of it.
She documented her recovery on TikTok, where she showed herself wearing a hospital gown when she was still covered in bandages.
Poggi said: 'I always remember it could have been worse. I try to keep a good attitude.'
The teen's due to start college soon at the University of San Francisco but, because of the burns, she's also preparing for several procedures to help with her recover.
A GoFundMe page was set up by Arbiso to help her cousin with medical expenses while she embarked on the next chapter of her life.
Arbiso wrote about Poggi: 'With the big move coming, multiple reconstruction surgeries, and a long emotional/physical recovery in her foreseeable future, [she's] going to need all the help she can get.'
Poggi hoped that her unfortunate experience would make other people think twice before they used specific types of firepits.
She said: 'I really want people to know the danger of using an alcohol-fueled pit because they are so common. We owned, I think, three of them.'
There were several types of tabletop alcohol-fueled firepit available to buy online and in stores. Some were fueled by gel fuel, wood, wood pellets, and propane.
Last year, multiple types of the vessel were recalled by the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission.
The recall on the popular brand Colsen's pits warned that 'alcohol flames can be invisible and lead to flame jetting when refilling the firepit reservoir'.
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