Apples, oranges, melons, and berries—they’re sweet, delicious, nutritious…and extremely dangerous, apparently. Here are some weird news stories about people who sustained some nasty injuries courtesy of nature’s candy.
Bad Breadfruit
In December 2017, a Salt Lake City woman named Valerie Zaugg took a vacation to Hawaii, home to an exotic piece of produce called the breadfruit. As Zaugg was sitting onboard a tour bus after coming out of the Polynesian Cultural Center, an unripe breadfruit, roughly the size of a baseball suddenly came flying through the closed window. Glass scattered everywhere, and the breadfruit slammed into Zaugg’s face. “I stood up and I just felt the blood rush down my face,” Surveillance video from a nearby building showed some teenagers running away from the scene of the crime, but police never caught the culprits.
Bad Watermelon
Henry Walker was shopping in an Alabama Wal-Mart one day in 2015 when he came across a huge display of watermelons for sale, displayed on a pallet. He reached to put one in his cart, but instead the watermelons came loose, spilled off, and knocked down Walker. He fell, and his foot got stuck underneath the watermelon-covered pallet. Walker sued Wal-Mart for what he said was a dangerous display…and a jury awarded him $7.5 million.
Bad Avocados
It may not be sweet, but avocado is a fruit. It’s also enjoying a big moment—avocado toasts are a popular brunch item from coast-to-coast, and it’s the chief ingredient in guacamole, a perennial favorite. Avocados sales are up, which also means that avocado injuries are up, especially “avocado hand.” People apparently use dull knives, or too-sharp knives, and have such a hard time working through the tough-skinned, pitted fruit that their hand slips and they slice themselves, rather than the avocado. In the U.K., where a few thousand cases of “avocado hand” have been reported in the last few years, a surgeons group wants the government to place warning stickers on the fruit instructing people how to cut them properly.