Mom recalls 'sheer terror' after teen hockey player's wrist artery cut by skate
Manitoban Mark Munday, 14, grateful for support of team, family, after suffering serious injury in game
When Mark Munday slid into the boards during a hockey game in Winnipeg last Sunday, he took a second to make sure he felt OK and his head was fine.
Then the 14-year-old's attention quickly turned to his wrist.
"I kind of looked at my hand, and then I saw there was lots of blood," said Mark, who plays forward for the AAA U15 Winnipeg Wild Red.
"I kind of saw my wrist, saw where it was cut, and I knew that place being cut is very serious."
Mark and his family later learned an artery in his wrist had been cut by a skate. Following a five-and-a-half hour surgery, doctors expect him to make a full recovery.
Mark and his mom, Darcie Munday, spoke with CBC about how grateful they are to those who helped care for him, and about the extra precaution they'll be taking when he gets back on the ice.
Mark's injury happened with about five minutes left in the first period. He remembers skating to the bench and letting people know he was hurt.
The team's trainer used towels in an effort to slow the bleeding, he said. Others rushed from the stands to help, including a nurse, a doctor and a fire-paramedic worker.
One parent held his head out of concern his neck may have been injured when he hit the boards, while others focused on his wrist, said Mark. His parents worked to take off his equipment.
"We held my arm up with lots of towels," Mark said. "I tried my best not to pass out, because I lost a lot of blood. So we were constantly dumping cold water on me, on my face, on my back."
He was taken by ambulance to hospital, where he underwent surgery to repair the injury Monday.
Grateful for 'amazing' trainer
His mom remembers the "sheer terror" she felt when she saw him get hurt.
"As soon as you see your child sliding on the ice, and the way he hit the boards with his head, [you] just kind of take a deep breath and, like, gasp," said Darcie. "You have that instinct something's wrong."
They originally feared it might be a serious spinal or head injury, she said, and she's thankful for the people who stepped up to help.
"It's really important to have that trainer there," who "was amazing. She was really calm," said Darcie.
She's also grateful for the help and support from family, friends, the hockey team, paramedics, doctors and nurses, she said.
It's a feeling echoed by Mark.
"My family has been great to me, and I've had many family and friends reach out," he said. "Everyone's crazy supportive and it's amazing."
Mark has to heal before he'll be back on the ice, but visited with his team and coaches on Thursday.
"Just being back at the rink, seeing all my buddies, it's just — it's amazing," he said.
It was special for his team's head coach too.
"Seeing his big smile today definitely uplifted me, and I know uplifted our coaches and our players," said Brett Wur.
Wur didn't see the initial impact at Sunday's game, but heard a bang and then the whistle.
"It wasn't until he got closer to the bench that you kind of start grasping the severity of the situation," he said.
Wur also pointed to the valuable role the team's trainer played that day.
"She took that situation that could have been, you know, possibly even worse, and really handled it really very professionally and handled it really quick," he said.
"Just want to thank everybody that obviously helped us all out, helped Mark out."
Some players decide on wrist guards
Wur said this is an incident that could happen in any hockey game. Some of his players reached out to the other player involved to let him know they understood it was an accident, he said.
"[That] just shows the character we have in our dressing room," he said.
Mark hasn't heard exactly when he will be able to start playing again, but said he will be wearing cut-resistant wrist guards and socks to help as a protective layer when he does.
"You know, maybe let other people know that it's probably a good idea to wear them, and then they could choose for themselves," he said.
About half of his teammates also made the choice to get wrist guards this week, his coaches said — something Wur thinks is a good idea.
"We play a fast game, where you have kind of two sharp knives on the bottom of your skates, and anything could happen," said Wur.
CBC asked Hockey Canada, the national governing body for hockey in the country, if it's looking at whether cut-resistant equipment such as wrist guards or socks should be mandatory in youth hockey.
Senior manager of corporate communications Jeremy Knight said by email the organization "is reviewing whether to expand the requirements of cut resistant equipment."
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