A West Virginia teenager required hospitalization after a popular squishy toy exploded in a hot car, coating her legs with scalding silicone gel and leaving visible burns on her thighs.
Kim Staggs had just picked up her daughter Natalee from her grandparents' house when the incident occurred. Unbeknownst to Staggs, one of the gelatinous toys — similar to viral mystery dumplings or NeeDoh cubes — had been left in the back seat of the vehicle.
"We weren't even a mile up the road, and she just lets out this blood-curdling scream," Staggs told KDKA, according to CBS. "My heart sank."
The car had inadvertently functioned as a solar oven, heating the toy until it weakened and expanded. When Natalee sat down in the back seat, the gel-filled bubble burst across her legs, releasing its contents at high temperature.
Staggs described looking back to see her daughter covered in a translucent, sticky liquid later identified as silicone. The substance had a consistency she compared to hot taffy after cooling, and it coated Natalee's thighs in a thick layer.
"The stuff inside of it was like this thick," Staggs recalled, speaking to KDKA. "The only way I could explain it was like a hot taffy after it had cooled."
Staggs immediately drove Natalee to the hospital, where medical personnel treated the burns with cooling agents and saline. Photographs shared by Staggs show her daughter's thighs visibly burned and covered in the viscous substance.
The incident could have been significantly worse, according to hospital staff. "That nurse said, 'You are not lucky, you're blessed,' because if it would've been a different type of squishy, it could've been really bad," Staggs recalled, speaking to KDKA. "It could've popped in her face, just anything."
These squishy toys have come under scrutiny following a TikTok trend in which children microwave the products, causing them to explode and spray hot gel on experimenters. The toys contain silicone gel that becomes dangerously hot when heated, whether by microwave or by sitting in a vehicle exposed to summer temperatures.
Staggs is now warning other parents about the dangers of leaving these seemingly harmless toys in hot vehicles during summer months. "If we can put a stop to it, that's the goal right there," she said, according to KDKA.
Natalee is not the only recent victim of exploding squishy toys. In May, a ten-year-old girl in the United Kingdom named Bella suffered burns to her face after microwaving a NeeDoh cube, an incident her mother described as traumatizing.
The West Virginia incident serves as a reminder that everyday items can become hazardous when exposed to high temperatures, particularly during summer months when vehicle interiors can reach extreme heat levels within minutes.