Talk about horrible timing. A Jet Ski driver from South Carolina, who works as a guide for the Hilton Head company, Sea Monkeys Watersports, was knocked out by a flying stingray last weekend (according to reports, it was a stingray and not a manta ray but that could change as investigators learn more). The ray jumped out of the water as 18-year-old Levi Dixon was operating the ski, knocking him unconscious and nearly drowning him.
Luckily, a nearby boat driver had turned his boat around after a beer koozie flew out to pick it up and witnessed the incident, saving the young man.
“If that koozie wouldn’t have flown out,” the boat’s operator, Thomas McDaniel told local media, things would have been much worse. “… It’s a miracle he’s alive.” McDaniel estimated that the ray was large at four-feet wide and 30 pounds.
McDaniel reportedly held Dixon’s head above water as his girlfriend, Joanna Whipple, called for help until they could get him loaded on the boat and back to rescue officials. Dixon ended up with two broken ribs, bruised lungs and swelling of his brain and was transferred to a local hospital. He reportedly has no memory of the accident. “It was definitely a miracle,” Dixon said.
