FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. – A 13-year-old who lost his hand in a fireworks accident earlier this month is speaking about the ordeal for the first time.
Javonte McNair has been out of the hospital for more than a week. He told Local 10 News that he lost his right hand and most of the sight in his left eye after a firework went off while he was holding it.
"Did you light it yourself?" Local 10 News reporter Shyann Malone asked.
"No," a shy McNair replied.
"Someone else lit it?" Malone asked.
"Yeah," McNair said.
"And what happened when they lit it?" Malone asked.
"It exploded," McNair said.
"Where?" Malone asked.
"In my hand and my face," McNair said.
Initially McNair claimed someone threw a firework at him and it went off in his hand as he tried to block it, but Friday that story changed. McNair told detectives that he tried to light a firework which other boys in his neighborhood were playing with July 8. He said he did not realize it was already lit when it exploded in his hand.
A GoFundMe page set up by his big brother in the Big Brothers Big Sisters of Broward County program provided the update.
"We are relieved to know no one intentionally hurt Javonte," Troy McHatton wrote. "We regretted that we had shared so much of the unconfirmed initial story. But when we thought how traumatic it must have been for a 13-year-old boy to look down at his arm and see the damage, to go through eight hours of surgery and to know that by doing something dumb, his life wouldn't be the same, we felt a flood of forgiveness."
McNair and his mother are grateful for the support. The soon-to-be seventh-grade student at Sunrise Middle School hopes to one day play football again.
"His dream is to play football, and that's what he even asked the surgeon that worked on his hand," Theresa McNair said.
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