May 23, 2012

"[A]n innocent little girl pushing a doll stroller on a sidewalk on a Sunday afternoon... suddenly... almost mortally wounded by an arrow falling from the sky."

"Aryanna's condition has been upgraded to fair, said John Densmore, the pediatric surgeon who removed the arrow from Aryanna during a 2 1/2 hour surgery Sunday at Children's Hospital of Wisconsin."
If there had been a difference in the trajectory of the arrow by 2 centimeters, "there could have been a very bad outcome....

"She could best be described as a 7-year-old bundle of strength... She was composed, she was calm and she was quiet."

Aryanna suffered wounds to her left lung, diaphragm, spleen, stomach and liver. All of her organs were preserved, and she is expected to experience no permanent dysfunction, Densmore said.
They haven't found out who shot the arrow.

UPDATE: Arrest: "The sheriff said a 16-year-old boy shot the arrow, saying he was shooting at a squirrel.

Read more: http://www.wisn.com/news/south-east-wisconsin/ozaukee-washington/Arrest-made-in-arrow-shooting/-/10151118/14423842/-/14h4otoz/-/index.html#ixzz1wYvYJaZf."

54 comments:

KCFleming said...

All points bulletin for Longfellow.

wyo sis said...

The arrow couldn't have come from very far away. Was Elizabeth Warren nearby? Maybe Ward Churchill?

WV I kid you not is tfrome Fakinges

Patrick said...

From playing drums for the Doors to a pediatric surgeon. Quite a leap.

DADvocate said...

Was Ted Nugent in town?

Michael said...

Just as some poorly educated people believe that a bullet shot into the air goes into space, Wisconsin archers appear to believe the same. Probably a progressive target practicing at the moon.

campy said...

I blame Sarah Palin and her violent, eliminationist rhetoric.

MadisonMan said...

If there had been a difference in the trajectory of the arrow by 2 centimeters

Meaningless statement. 2 centimeters in a different direction and it would have passed by harmlessly. So?

sakredkow said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
MadisonMan said...

By the way -- how do we know for sure that young girl is innocent.

I'm just being nitpicky today. That article is full of meaningless words.

wv: justzen rtseens

Maybe I should be just zen.

Robert said...

From the article:

"She's mad. She wants to know why this happened to her when she didn't do anything wrong,"

I suspect an awful lot of Wisconsin school children will be asking this of their teachers after the tantrums the teachers will throw the day after the recall election.

But I digress.

Scott M said...

Meaningless statement. 2 centimeters in a different direction and it would have passed by harmlessly. So?

It's not meaningless. It means all of the events, trauma, experiences, emotions resulting in this strike would not have happened and the ripples in the lives of those affected would not have happened.

I had a boss once that closed up late, got in his car, and got on the interstate to go home. He was decapitated by a oncoming semi-truck's rim that had broken off, crossed over the median and slammed into his windshield, killing him instantly.

Think about the accuracy involved and all of the things that had to line up to make that happen. And think about all the things that happened because he died and the ripples of effects that spread out through the lives of everyone affected.

Anonymous said...

i think kids are taking "hunger games" too seriously.

am happy the little girl is alright; otherwise i wouldn't be joking.

kcom said...

"She's mad. She wants to know why this happened to her when she didn't do anything wrong,"

Because life is unfair. And random. And so it goes. And no amount of government spending will change that.

Scott M said...

And no amount of government spending will change that.

Oh, bullshit. I don't recall "Julia" getting hit with an arrow.

Eric the Fruit Bat said...

Pediatric surgery is a beautiful thing.

There are guys who can fix babies in utero

Fucking amazing.

Palladian said...

I think the solution to this problem is obvious: it's time to ban bows and arrows. How many innocent children have been injured or killed by this 64,000-year-old scourge?

Robert said...

Actually, Julia dodges arrows daily.

They're all fired by Mitt when he was at Bain, but not by the guy who still is at Bain who donates heavily to Obama.

You can't shoot an arrow and bundle at the same time, you see.

MadisonMan said...

It means all of the events, trauma, experiences, emotions resulting in this strike would not have happened and the ripples in the lives of those affected would not have happened.

But that is always happening, whether something actually happens in the end or not. How many times did an arrow fall harmlessly to the ground? It's news here because it hit an child. But it's not news that a small deviation would have caused more (or less) harm. That is typical and is happening constantly.

Richard Dolan said...

"An innocent little girl ...."

You see this turn of phrase frequently in stories of this sort -- an 'innocent' bystander getting injured by being in the wrong place at the wrong time. It's become a favored journalistic cliche.

What does innocence have to do with it, and what would it mean in this context to say a little girl in her situation was guilty of something? I suppose it's the concept of blamelessness that the word is intended to invoke, but the context renders the entire idea an oxymoron. The real sting comes from the randomness of the victim -- it could have been anyone -- but that's not an idea that 'innocence' calls to mind.

If the person who shot the arrow had selected his victim for a reason, the little girl would almost certainly still be blameless even though the shooting would no longer be random. But we'd want to know why she was selected as the victim to form a judgment about what was really going on. 'Innocence' would remain an odd fit to describe the situation since it draws the wrong kind of contrast.

Anonymous said...

Would this not have been a problem if the girl had been "guilty"?

jungatheart said...

Shaped narrative, someone call da police!

Shanna said...

"She's mad. She wants to know why this happened to her when she didn't do anything wrong,"

I think this is a good time to have a 'stuff happens' conversation with this kid. (although that really does suck, hope she gets better soon).

Nom, nom... said...

Jesus Christ. This is something you'd only think happens in Wisconsin!s

Nom, nom... said...

That's it! This Strongbow Cider marketing campaign has gone too far!

Dust Bunny Queen said...

By the way -- how do we know for sure that young girl is innocent

LOL my very thoughts. Maybe she stole some cookies or something.

Nom, nom... said...

Someone's in heap big trouble.

Nom, nom... said...

Dammit. Nom Nom = Jason. I think my girlfriend's been blogging again.

Of course, she'll try to lie and try to convince me she's using her online handle for hooking and scoring drugs. Dammit!

Ann Althouse said...

""She's mad. She wants to know why this happened to her when she didn't do anything wrong."

The implication is that bad kids should get shot with arrows.

Ann Althouse said...

Seriously, my heart goes out to the little girl and I'm immensely proud of our University of Wisconsin hospital.

But this "innocent victim" concept has always bothered me.

David said...

The girl was mad?

Good for her. She should be mad. Sounds like the perfect reaction to me.

Eric the Fruit Bat said...

The use of the word "innocent" makes perfect sense if you believe (or want to believe) in an all-knowing, powerful, loving and just God.

Palladian said...

I have a drawing for every occasion...

Scott M said...

The use of the word "innocent" makes perfect sense if you believe (or want to believe) in an all-knowing, powerful, loving and just God.

In what way? Christian theology is built on the foundation of original sin, isn't it? We're all born guilty. (Thanks again, Eve)

jungatheart said...

lol DBQ

Triangle Man said...

@ScottM

Christian theology and South Park both.

TWM said...

"The implication is that bad kids should get shot with arrows."

Depends on how bad. I know a couple of brats I wouldn't mind popping with a BB gun.

traditionalguy said...

Is her last name Hamlet?

She certainly experienced the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune.

But tomorrow's another day.

jungatheart said...

Eve was innocent, she pled down to felony nagging.

Wince said...

Prime Suspect.

Offering proof we need an "arrow tax".

I shoot an arrow into the air, where it lands I do not care: I get my arrows wholesale.

(Seriously, though, I do hope she'll make a full recovery.)

Scott M said...

Eve was innocent, she pled down to felony nagging.

I thought it was the public nudity that got her.

Dumb Plumber said...

I think this is a good time to have a 'stuff happens' conversation with this kid

Absolutely. I know many adults who would have benefited by this talk and probably still need to hear it.

Dust Bunny Queen said...

Ack!! accidentally posted on my husbands account (dumbplumber). A well

Paul said...

It was a field point arrow thankfully. A broadhead would have killed her outright.

Now I'm both a rifle and bow hunter and I can tell you a rifle round fired almost strait up won't hurt anyone BUT an arrow, fired at any angle, sure will kill.

I bet some stupid kids were shooting arrows within 200 yards for that to happen.


They need to check and see if it, due to plastic fleching, was a compound bow (which has farther range than a recurve bow.)

dbp said...

From the X-Ray in the story, it looks as if the arrow came down at a reasonably steep angle. Given the arrow type and length, one might be able to make a good estimate of the power of the bow and hence the range it was fired from. If it can be ascertained the position of the girl when she was struck, say by the position of her doll stroller, then that would give the azimuth from which the shot was fired.

All of this might be enough to get this down to a reasonably small area. Knock on all the doors and ask who shoots a bow in his back yard.

The whole story reminds me a bit of the Kurt Vonnegut novel Deadeye Dick.

bagoh20 said...

This was no boating accident. I would start with questioning the local deer. Look for motive.

MadisonMan said...

A broadhead would have killed her outright.

But it would have followed a different trajectory and likely missed her altogether.

This does remind me of the time when I was in grad school and a bullet went through the window of an office on the 10th floor. The windows were double-paned, so you could use the two holes (and the hole in the ceiling) to ascertain where the bullet came from. Not sure if anyone was ever arrested, however.

Mike (MJB Wolf) said...

Once a motorcycle fell from the sky and bounced off the dashboard of the truck I was in, missing me by less than a foot. Strange what can happen in this world. The motorcyclist ended up in the bed of the truck, dazed but intact.

Scott M said...

But it would have followed a different trajectory and likely missed her altogether.

Look. When an elf wants to hit a target...

ndspinelli said...

There was a case in Chicago a few years back where a homeless man was killed via an arrow on Lower Wacker Drive. I believe it remains unsolved. He got wacked on Wacker. Maybe there's a serial killer out there.

Cincinnatus said...

Its a heart warming story to see the wonders of medical science applied to this young lady.

But it is fun to ridicule the tendentious hack journalism too.

An arrow has a very limited range. I believe that sufficiently diligent police work would find the person responsible.

Blue@9 said...

Clearly none of this would have happened but for the evil archery lobby.

We need bow control!

Blue@9 said...

My reaction to this was "Holy cow I'm so glad I never killed anyone when I was a kid" because that was exactly the kind of stuff I did, i.e. shooting off homemade weapons haphazardly. I made bows, catapults, mortars, rockets, etc., all fired off with little consideration about what was downrange.

Methadras said...

Robert said...

From the article:

"She's mad. She wants to know why this happened to her when she didn't do anything wrong,"


No one explained to her that bad things happen to good people yet?

Methadras said...

Palladian said...

How many innocent children have been injured or killed by this 64,000-year-old scourge?


Before or after nanny-statism?