Fan has life-threatening injuries after hit by broken bat at Fenway Park

USA TODAY Sports

A woman suffered life-threatening injuries after she was hit by a broken bat at Friday night's Boston Red Sox and Oakland Athletics game at Fenway Park, officials told the Associated Press.

The incident occurred in the second inning when part or all from A's third baseman Brett Lawrie's bat flew into the stands and struck her. She was sitting behind home plate, just to the third-base side.

Boston police spokesman David Estrada says that the bat hit her on the head.

"You try to keep her in your thoughts and, hopefully, everything's all right and try to get back to the task at hand," said Lawrie, when asked how he was able to refocus after what happened. "Hopefully everything's OK and she's doing all right.

"I've seen bats fly out of guys' hands in(to) the stands and everyone's OK, but when one breaks like that, has jagged edges on it, anything can happen."

Alex Merlis, of Brookline, Massachusetts, said he was sitting in the row behind the woman when the broken bat flew into the stands just a few rows from the field.

"It was violent," he said of the impact to her forehead and top of her head. "She bled a lot. A lot. I don't think I've ever seen anything like that."

Merlis said the woman had been sitting with a small child and a man. After she was injured, the man was tending to her and other people were trying to console the distraught child, he said.

After the final out of the inning, the game was delayed for quite some time so medical staff could tend to her. She was wheeled off on the stretcher and taken to Beth Israel Medical Center.

"First and foremost, our thoughts and concern, and certainly our prayers, go out to the woman that was struck with the bat, her and her family," said Red Sox manager John Farrell. "A scary moment, certainly.

"All you can think about is a family, they come to a ballgame to hopefully get three hours of enjoyment, and unfortunately with how close our stands are to the field of action, an accident like this tonight is certainly disturbing."

Concerned about a rash of flying broken bats and the danger they posed, Major League Baseball studied the issue in 2008 and made a series of changes to bat regulations for the following season.

Multi-piece bat failure incidents are down approximately 50% since the start of the 2009 season, MLB spokesman Michael Teevan said.

Though dozens of baseball fans are struck by foul balls each season, there has been only one fatality from such an incident, according to baseball researchers — a 14-year-old boy killed by a foul line drive off the bat of Manny Mota at Dodger Stadium in 1970.

The National Hockey League ordered safety netting installed at each end of NHL arenas after 13-year-old Brittanie Cecil was killed by a deflected puck at a Columbus Blue Jackets game in 2002. She died two days later, and her parents eventually obtained a $1.2 million settlement from the team, the league and the arena management.

Information from the Associated Press was used in this report.