A popular ABC presenter has urged travellers to exercise caution when using accessible toilets abroad after he burned his arm in a horror accident.
Charles Brice was taking a shower while staying at a hotel in Berlin last week before covering the Paralympics in Paris when he placed his hand on a metal ledge.
The journalist and digital producer did not realize that the seemingly harmless structure was a mixer that transported hot water.
Mr Brice had no idea of the serious damage caused until he emerged from the shower and discovered his hand was covered in burns.
Blisters formed on his forearm and parts of his skin had swollen or melted.
His good friend Shane Hryhorec then uploaded a video to TikTok to reveal the nasty burns he sustained.
“Don’t let this happen to you,” Hryhorec warned on his Wheel around the World account.
Mr Hryhorec, a well-known disability rights advocate, explained that in Europe and the UK shower mixers are installed externally fixed to the wall, unlike in Australia.
Charles Brice (pictured) was taking a shower while staying at a hotel in Berlin last week when he placed his hand on a metal ledge.
“The hot water faucet and the pipe that runs through it to mix the hot and cold water are actually outside the wall,” Hryhorec said.
Shower mixers are bathroom systems that mix hot and cold water to establish the appropriate water temperature and flow.
Several pharmacies in the German capital told Brice that treating his burns would cost him thousands of dollars.
“He said, ‘Whatever you do, never lean on the mixer,'” Mr. Hryhorec said. Yahoo.
‘Anyone with a disability or children, or anyone who needs to be cared for.
“One pharmacy said it would cost $3,000 for the material, another pharmacy said it would cost $500 for the material.”
The ABC presenter discovered his arm was covered in burns before blisters began to form as parts of his skin lifted off (pictured)
Mr Brice (pictured with News Breakfast presenters Lisa Millar and Michael Rowland) urged Australians not to lean on the ledge when using accessible showers while travelling overseas.
The couple have urged Australians not to lean on the edge when getting into the shower.
“The moral of the story is that you shouldn’t shower in Europe,” Hryhorec joked.
Mr Brice was in Berlin for a short holiday before his reporting duties for the Paralympic Games, which began last week.
He is a disability rights advocate and public speaker who began his career at the ABC in 2019.
Her passion for television news arose after undergoing a grueling 14-month rehabilitation period following a horrific motorcycle accident in 2010.
Mr Brice broke two vertebrae in his neck and completely severed his spinal cord after hitting a bumpy road during a motorcycle trip.
He flew off the bike before landing headfirst on the ground.
Mr. Brice is also co-founder of the Wheel To Walk initiative, which has raised more than $300,000 for spinal cord injury research.