A 13-year-old girl has been in intensive care for two weeks with third-degree burns after setting herself on fire while trying to copy a TikTok stunt.
Destini Crane, from Portland, Oregon, seriously burned her neck and right arm while apparently trying to copy a trick where someone draws a shape with flammable liquid on a mirror before setting it on fire.
In the home bathroom where the seventh grader attempted the risky stunt on 13 May, her mother found a candle, a lighter and a bottle of rubbing alcohol, which is believed to have exploded in the poorly-ventilated space.
‘I was in the living room talking with my mom, and I heard her scream my name,’ Kimberly Crane told ABC News. ‘So I went and opened the bathroom door and everything was on fire. Destini was on fire. Things in the bathroom were on fire.’
Kimberly took her daughter outside and managed to remove her burning shirt while a neighbour called 911.
Destini, who Kimberly said ‘lived for TikToks’, was taken to intensive care where she has been ever since.
She has been unable to speak since the incident but her family pieced together what had happened by what they found and by speaking to friends. Her phone was still recording footage after the explosion.
Kimberly said she hopes Destini will be able to move into a burn unit soon, but she is expected to need several months to recover and regain mobility in her neck, shoulders and fingers, as well as the use of her arm.
‘That is just going to be a lifelong thing, of her doing physical therapy to keep her mobility,’ Kimberly said.
She added that she wanted to share what had happened to raise awareness of the danger of similar stunts.