Steve Irwin Death (Crocodile Hunter, Stingray)

Steve Irwin (also known as the Crocodile Hunter) lived

from 2/22/64 to 9/4/06. He delighted people of all ages

with his over-the-top personality, antics with fearsome

animals, and Australian accent. At times, he seemed

invincible, able to wrestle giant alligators and never get

eaten by one even though he was rapidly lunged at in

slippery muddy swamps. Surprisingly, Steve Irwin did

not die from an alligator but from a stingray. It is this

injury that is focused on below.

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On 9/4/06, at around 11:00 am, Steve Irwin was filming an underwater documentary

entitled Ocean’s Deadliest in the Great Barrier Reef of Australia (east of Port Douglas).

He began swimming in shallow water at Batt Reef, near the Low Isles, when he began to

swim above a stingray, estimated to be about 2.5mm from wingtip to wingtip. The stingray

apparently felt threatened, stopped, turned, and lashed its tail upwards. A poisonous

stingray barb on the stingray’s tail pierced Irwin’s chest and entered his heart. There is

actually not much distance between the outer chest wall and the heart, making it easy to

pierce that organ. What actually killed him, however, was pulling the barb out of his chest

because this caused more damage to the heart than the initial impact. The poison had

nothing to do with his death. Some medical professionals have stated that it is actually

safer to temporally leave such an object in the body and wait for emergency medical

providers to remove it. However, when someone has an object pierce their heart, the first

instinct will naturally be to pull it out. After pulling out the stingray barb, Mr. Irwin

collapsed. He was breathing but barely conscious and died by the time he was taken on

his boat, Croc One.