A mother of five in Florida has died after suffering burns all over her body in a horrific background fire pit accident.
38-year-old Nicole Foltz and her husband, Jeff, started a fire last month to keep the bugs away at their home in Tarpon Springs.
Jeff said that the fire fizzled at one point while he was inside the house and his wife tried to reignite it.
“I had just gone inside and to my knowledge, she decided to try to keep the fire going, keep the fun going, and she put another log on it and there wasn’t much flame at all,” he told reporters.
“But she just, I guess, felt to pour a little gas on it, and it would reignite, and it did. I guess it must’ve traveled the gas stream up to the gas can, and it exploded in her hands,” he explained.
He said that Nicole “actually stopped, dropped, and rolled like you are supposed to.”
Despite her efforts, she was engulfed in flames and had almost all of her body burned. Three days after the tragedy, she passed away on Nov. 17.
Their 11-year-old son, Jeffrey, had to be also sent to the hospital after suffering second and third-degree burns over half of his body. The boy has since returned home, where he continues to recover from the severe injuries.
“I never left his side in the hospital, which is difficult, especially because I feel bad for other children there. I can see how it is to not have somebody that can be there for you by your bedside 24/7,” his dad said. “He’s staying pretty strong. I’m sure the whole crew there was really surprised to hear that two days after we got home, he was walking.”
Nicole was a manager at the Tarpon Tavern and is described to be an “all-around one of the best, genuine people. She had a fierceness to her. Everybody loved her.”
“I don’t want to read about somebody else’s family having to go through this. It’s unimaginable,” Jeff said. “It’s just one of those senseless acts you don’t expect to happen in your family … gasoline is not a joke when it comes to fire. You have to be careful or just don’t do it at all.”
