Surgeons Reattach NorCal Girl's Hand Severed By Jump Rope

A South Bay girl is talking about a freak accident involving a jump rope that sliced off her hand.

Two weeks ago, 6-year-old Erica Rix was riding down Daves Avenue in Los Gatos in the back of her mother's SUV on the way back home from soccer practice.  Erica was dangling a jump rope out of the window when it got tangled in the axle of the car.

The slipknot on the jump rope was wrapped around her wrist and when the rope wrapped around the tire's axle, it tightened around her left hand and sliced it off. 

"I just screamed and she stopped the car," Erica said.

Erica's mother, Allison stopped the car, unaware her daughter had been playing with the rope out the car window.

"She was screaming and screaming so I got out of the car. And out of the window that was cracked, the remaining part of her hand was -- and most of it was gone," Rix said.

"I said, 'Where's her hand?  Where's her hand?' And a lady, I think her name was Pat, said, 'It's here. I'm standing over it and there's a rope attached to it.'"


Another driver stopped and used his belt to create a tourniquet around Erica's arm.  She was rushed to Stanford Hospital where a team of four surgeons spent 10 hours successfully reattaching her hand. 

Erica doesn't have feeling or movement in her hand yet but doctors hope that will change with future surgeries. 

The Rix family has been getting lots of help from strangers to help pay their enormous medical bills.

Erica had received many cards and stuffed animals.  Some people have even volunteered to tutor her home while she recovers.


Asked why she was dangling the rope out of the window, Erica said, "I wanted to see it go up and down because I thought it would fly." 
 

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