Dog Retrieves Hand After Man Loses It In Firecracker Explosion

(CBS) – A Chicago nurse got a rude awakening Thursday afternoon when a man in her Portage Park neighborhood blew off his hand with a firecracker – a body part that was found hours later by the nurse's dog.

Cheri Steigert normally works the overnight shift and was sleeping around 3:30 p.m. when she heard a large explosion and a scream.

She learned that a man had been injured in a fireworks explosion and lost at least two fingers. A few hours later, she learned it was even worse.

Steigert let her dog out in the yard, and it returned with something in its mouth and dropped the item – a bunny rabbit, she thought, at first.

"I came back out to pick it up, and I found out it was the other part of the young man's hand," she tells CBS 2.

She called authorities.

The Chicago Fire Department says a 39-year-old man was injured in the 3900 block of North Austin by a firework equivalent to a half-stick of dynamite. He was rushed to trauma care at Lutheran General Hospital.

The hand was found about 250 feet away at Steigert's residence, on West Dakin.