As reported by NBC Philadelphia, Jackass star Ryan Dunn had been driving his sports car down Route 322 in West Goshen, Philadelphia, when he lost control of the vehicle. His car was a powerful 2007 Porsche 911 GT3, which reportedly crashed through a guardrail and flew through the air in a nearby forest. The soaring vehicle then collided head-on with a tree and exploded. “Upon arrival, police located one vehicle off the road and in the woods that was fully engulfed in flames,” said a police report.
The coroner’s report was published within days of the remains being recovered from the crash site, with Chester County coroner’s office outlining two causes of death for the two men: blunt force trauma and thermal trauma. A 2023 article published by the National Library of Medicine claims that blunt-force trauma is the leading cause of death in people under 35, with vehicle collisions being the primary cause of such injuries through other forceful impacts, such as in fall, or being struck by a blunt object. Such injuries differ from penetrative trauma, in which a sharp object pierces the skin. Nevertheless, blunt force trauma can result in lacerations to the flesh, and devastating damage to the skeleton in the form of fractures, and injury to the internal organs.
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Thermal trauma describes injuries resulting from exposure to intense heat. Horrifically, its inclusion in the coroner’s report means that the coroner could not rule out that it was the explosion and flames of the wreckage that proved fatal to the Dunn and Zachary Hartwell.
