CPS 2000 myth not a myth?

[Ben]

A week or two ago I was looking at our referrer logs when I noticed this: http://www.ultimate-guitar.com/forum...1&postcount=37

At some youth camp my aunt (whos a nurse) had to treat someone whos eyeball half came out after someone shot them in the eye with an XP2000 or something.

That's much more specific than anything else I've heard. I'll be contacting this guy to learn more and see maybe if we could get something like a newspaper article.

[Silence]

I'm in total agreement with you. Ugh. There may be some truth to that after all. I'm thinking it was at point-blank range, obviously to the face, but you never know.

[Aurum]

isnt that partly why they never made them that string again? i thought this is what happened originally, where someone took a shot to the face at point-blank range.

This is science, if high-pressure water is pushed into the eye, the eye is forced out by the pressure. Im wondering how much stress this would place on the opticnerves, stretching to hold the eyeball?

[Ben]

Here's the message I sent to the guy:

I run a website about water guns. I was recently checking my referrer logs from my website when I noticed a thread here and I started reading it. You mentioned that your aunt treated a kid whose eye half popped out after being shot with a CPS 2000. A very similar story has been going around water gun websites for years without any serious verification so this comes across to me as surprising. Would you mind pointing me in the right direction to find out more about this? If you know your aunt's email address or know any newspaper that published the story that would be great. Thanks.

All we can do now is wait for a response.

[Silence]

Aurum, the problem was that there wasn't really any documentation of such an incident. It never made the news, nothing. The only claims were fictional stories from parents who were concerned with the power of some water guns. From what I know, even Wild Boys, an older member of Soakerdom, wrote up some account at some shopping website in a review of the CPS 3200, I believe.

This incident actually has specifics and we have a potential way to verify the claim. That's big.

[Ben]

isnt that partly why they never made them that string again? i thought this is what happened originally, where someone took a shot to the face at point-blank range.

This is science, if high-pressure water is pushed into the eye, the eye is forced out by the pressure. Im wondering how much stress this would place on the opticnerves, stretching to hold the eyeball?

When Super Soaker employees were asked why the CPS 2000 was discontinued, they said it was to sell the CPS 2500. I think it's more likely that the CPS 2000 was getting too expensive to manufacture with such a thick chamber so they toned it down a bit than safety concerns caused them to change their minds. Though with this in mind I could be wrong.

I really highly doubt it would pop someone's eye out completely. The water would have to go behind the eye to dislodge it. The water would have to be shooting at the eye, which would push it in. The eye would push back too, but with equal force and not enough to push it out. That's why I never completely bought the eye popping part of the story. Partially popped out makes more sense to me.

Most likely I think the stream hit on the side and that would get water behind the eye loosening it. That seems most likely.

[cantab]

There must be records of people getting hit in the eye with things like fire hoses or pressure washers. That would give us an idea of what injuries could actually happen.

Slightly related - was the 2500 (along with the 1500 and 3000) the first Super Soaker to feature a rotating nozzle selector? I certainly know of no XP with that feature.

[Ben]

The SS 200 was the first with some sort of nozzle selector. I can't tell from the picture if it rotates but it does have some sort of nozzle selector.

Some XPs had nozzle selectors too. The XP 250 and XP 310 are two that come to mind.

[Drenchenator]

I hope this guy contacts Ben. It might verify where the story came from.

The CPS 2500 wasn't the first, but was the first to have a nozzle selector with riot blast. The SS 200's nozzle selector was for the most part a gimmick because it didn't really change the output too much. But it was the first, released in 1991.

[Ben]

I got a reply back:

My mum (aunts sister) and brother will know more about it, i'll pm you as soon as i get a good amount of information.

More waiting I guess, but it's good to know that he's looking into it.

[Ben]

No new response. I'm going to send a new message tomorrow in case he forgot.

[cantab]

I bet it'll turn out to be that his aunt didn't treat it or even see it, but heard it from one of her friends, and so on and so on.

[Josh]

Sorry for bumping a somewhat old thread, but, Ben, did you ever get any more responses back from him?

[Ben]

I never received another response. I'll send one again.