French fitness model Rebecca Burger, 33, died in her home after a freak accident on June 18, her family shared on her popular Instagram page.
Burger was hit in the thorax by a defective whip cream canister, causing a heart attack that killed her.
Her family shared a warning and photo of the device on Burgers Instagram page.
“Do not use this kind of utensil in your home! Several tens of thousands of defective devices are still in circulation.”
The canister was the reusable kind that uses disposable pressurized N20 cartridges to whip and propel the cream.
Benjamin Douriez, deputy chief editor at 60 Million Consumers magazine said the problems with this specific brand of canister are well known.
“We were shocked of course but not surprised because, unfortunately, we’ve been warning about the potential dangerousness of this product for years and we’d already flagged some 60 accidents with other injuries, sometimes serious ones. Sadly, we knew this was something that could have happened one day,” he said.
Douriez said the pressure inside the canisters can reach 10 bars, far more than the 2 bars of pressure that can be reached inside a pressure cooker.
“The pressure inside is tremendous and if the dispenser isn’t strong enough or if you haven’t been using it appropriately, there’s a risk that it might explode. When it explodes, the top end is ejected in an extremely violent way,” Douriez said.
Douriez said that the manufacturer, Ard’Time, organized a recall of that specific product but many consumers were not aware.
The canister was withdrawn from the market in 2013, officials and the company that makes the product said on Thursday.
The prosecutor’s office in the eastern city of Mulhouse said an investigation is underway into Burger’s death and whether a faulty siphon on a high-pressure canister used to make and dispense whipped cream was at fault.
Matthew Little for NTD
