Sunday was a bad day for a 20-year-old wine cellar worker who survived a twenty-six gallon fish tank falling on his head during a 6.0 earthquake that injured scores of people, trashed buildings, destroyed roads and smashed hundreds of wine bottles in Napa Valley.
Steven Smith was visiting a friend and decided to spend the night and sleep on the floor. When the earthquake started rocking, the massive fish tank, which weighed hundreds of pounds, came crashing down off its metal stand, landing on his him and sliced up his head and his left arm, according to SFGate.
Fortunately, a local firefighter was on alert in the neighborhood searching for people with injuries and spotted Smith. He helped bandage his head and hand and a friend drove him to the Valley Medical Center in Napa. Arriving at the hospital bloodied and barefoot, doctors treated him immediately by inserting several staples in his head and closed the wound on his left arm with more than a dozen stitches.
According to his friends, Smith had been sleeping face down — and when the tank fell on his head he stood up and started speaking gibberish.
“I was in shock; I didn’t know what happened. I felt liquid running down my body. I rubbed my head and noticed I had blood on my hand,” the beleaguered Smith explained.
Smith says he looks forward to getting back to work and was grateful for the camaraderie that was expressed in the hospital. “I felt like we were all in this together,” he said.
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