Flying Fish Breaks Teen’s Jaw

First posted on 09-08-2008

Seth Russell, age 15 of Crossett, Arkansas, was being pulled along in an inner tube behind a boat in Lake Chicot when a Silver Asian carp leaped from the water, hitting young Seth square in the face.

The blow knocked Seth unconscious and he was rushed to a nearby hospital. Seth said he does not remember the fish, only waking up at the hospital. But the collision was enough to require oral surgery to immobilize his jaw while the break repairs. The boy also experiences back pain, apparently from a whiplash he sustained during the impact.

Officials at the fisheries center at the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff said that the Silver Asian carp population is growing in Lake Chicot and that other reports of the fish jumping up out of the water have been made recently.

Silver Asian carp came to the U.S. as imports by catfish farmers about thirty years ago. The consume algae and other water vegetation, making them natural pond cleaners.