Man, 19, Loses Hand Setting Off Dynamite for the Holiday

A 19-year-old Reseda man’s hand was blown off early Friday after he lighted a stick of dynamite to celebrate Independence Day, forcing a two-block section of his neighborhood to be evacuated while police searched for more explosives he had hidden in his family’s garage.

Chris Sterline was reported in stable condition at Northridge Hospital Medical Center on Friday afternoon. His hand, which was disintegrated by the blast three inches above his right wrist, could not be saved, police and a hospital spokeswoman said.

No one else was hurt in the 2:20 a.m. blast, which dislodged concrete in a driveway in the 7400 block of Wystone Avenue, where Sterline and a 16-year-old friend brought the dynamite.

The younger teen-ager escaped injury because “he was smart enough to walk away and was 40 to 50 feet away when the explosion occurred,” Los Angeles Police Detective Olivia Pixler said.

Sterline, she said, “was probably very lucky that the force of the blast went away from him rather than toward him.”

Pat Marek, a spokesman for the Los Angeles Fire Department, said no other fireworks-related injuries were reported in the city on the Fourth of July.

Officers with the police bomb squad found about five sticks of dynamite in the Sterline garage and detonated them without incident, Pixler said. Sterline told investigators he found the dynamite about a year ago and had been hiding it in the garage without his family’s knowledge, she said.

Sterline and his companion had taken the dynamite from Sterline’s house in the 19000 block of Valerio Street to a third friend’s house on nearby Wystone Avenue, Pixler said. That friend was asleep, but the two lighted the stick in his driveway without him.

Police may seek felony charges against Sterline for possession of explosives, Pixler said.

Exactly where Sterline found the dynamite was unclear Friday because he was heavily sedated when interviewed at the hospital, Pixler said. He told police he found the explosives at a construction site and at an apartment building. Investigators said he would be interviewed again.

Neighbors said they were awakened by the explosion and found Sterline staggering in the middle of the street calling for his friend, who police declined to identify because of his age.

“He kept saying over and over, ‘Why did I do this to myself? Why did I do this to myself?” said Linda Hust, who tried to keep Sterline calm until paramedics arrived. She said the blast that injured Sterline followed one about 20 minutes earlier.

Another neighbor, Frank Pauline, said his house shook. “At first, I thought it was another earthquake, then I figured it was the Fourth of July,” Pauline said.

Residents of Wystone Avenue, Donna Avenue and Topeka Drive were evacuated from their homes for about four hours while bomb squad members searched for the remaining explosives.