4 Hondurans flown to Boston after gas explosion in marketplace

When a gas explosion ripped through a crowded marketplace in Honduras last month, Paola Matute Porter suffered burns over 40 percent of her body. Now, she and three other children who were among dozens of shoppers engulfed in flames are receiving free medical treatment at a Boston hospital specializing in burn care.

The gas cylinder explosion rocked the market in Tegucigalpa on Feb 20 as Paola and her family were eating lunch. The blast killed at least one child and wounded more than 70 other people. Paola's mother recalled her 9-year-old running to her, screaming for help.

"The skin on her arms was falling off, and her face was melting," Paola Porter Avila said recently from her daughter's bedside. "I yelled to her to stop so I could take her clothes off so they wouldn't continue to burn her."

Paola and other injured family members initially were taken to a local hospital. But thanks to local and international charities, Paola was among four children who were flown nearly 6,120 km from Honduras' capital to Shriners Hospital for Children in Boston.

Paola, the most seriously injured of the children, has had two major operations since arriving at Shriners on Feb 27. In the most recent, doctors spent more than four hours grafting skin from her legs onto her badly burned arms, hands and fingers.

"This skin grafting is actually lifesaving for her," said Dr Philip Chang, who operated on Paola.

"As long as she had burn wounds on her body that were not covered with her own skin, she would be at grave risk of having an infection that could lead to overwhelming bacterial infection that could lead to death."

The four children, who range in age from 6 months to 16 years, are all expected to make a full recovery, Chang said.