Horror New Year's fireworks accident in Bali leaves Aussie dad fighting to save both of his hands

A father-of-two is at risk of losing both his hands after a firework he was holding exploded, leaving them ‘unrecognisable’.

Nick Gilbert, 58, was lighting fireworks on Kelan Beach in Bali at 3am on New Year’s Day when a charge inside one spontaneously exploded.

Onlookers caught the moment that the Adelaide Hill man collapsed to the ground on video, as both his hands were badly damaged in the blast and good Samaritans came rushing to his aid.

Mr Gilbert has been living on the Indonesian island for the last four years and now requires several complex operations to save what remains of his hands.

The country’s medical system requires him to pay upfront for the surgeries.

He launched a GoFundMe on January 9 asking for help to afford the operations, without which both hands will need amputating.

Nick Gilbert, 58, originally from the Adelaide Hills but now living in Bali, is fighting to keep his hands after a New Year’s Day firework accident left them ‘unrecognisable’

At 3am on Kelan Beach the father-of-two was lighting fireworks before one of them exploded while he was holding it, badly injuring his hands

Mr Gilbert’s five-year-old daughter Hayley wrote the description for her father’s fundraiser as he was still unable to use his hands.

‘[Dad] can’t write this for you because he was severely injured by a fireworks explosion on NYE in Bali, almost losing his hands,’ Hayley wrote.

‘Dad thinks he’s lucky that he still has a hand. He can’t even wipe his own butt.

‘If everything goes right he should be able to wipe it again himself one day.’

The family is asking for $200,000 in order to afford surgeries costing $10,000 each, pharmaceuticals, doctors appointments and rent, as Mr Gilbert cannot work.

He initially moved to Jimbaran, near Kuta, with his wife Triana and children, Hayley and Henry, to teach people how to surf and is now the managing director of Fliteboard Fliteschool. 

Retelling the accident from her father’s perspective, Hayley wrote that he was left with bones and tendons dangling from his damaged hands. 

‘I held it low away from my face, several shots successfully performed [but] the final [shot] exploded in the tube. The force was immense, shattering and splitting both my hands,’ she wrote. 

‘It looked far from salvageable, heavily bleeding… a mess.

‘Things important seconds earlier are now not. Everything started with the fun. One second later the world suddenly stopped being fun.’

After being rushed to the hospital from the beach by kind strangers, Mr Gilbert was tended to by surgeons who stabilised his condition. 

Mr Gilbert lost two fingers on his right hand and half his thumb, and suffered extensive damage to his palm and other fingers before finding out that his insurance wouldn’t cover him

Mr Gilbert moved to Jimbaran, near Kuta, with his wife Triana and children, Hayley and Henry, to teach people how to surf and is now the managing director of Fliteboard Fliteschool

In total he lost two fingers on his right hand and half his thumb, with extensive damage to his palm and other fingers.

Once he came to he was told that the family’s 10 year private health insurance policy would not cover the cost to reconnect tendons, graft skin or repair muscle damage. 

In a best-case scenario doctors said that 50 to 60 per cent of his hands’ former function might be able to be returned. 

In the meantime Mr Gilbert said that he has had to send potential customers to his competitor since he cannot work and that he may have to sell the family car. 

His spirits are remaining high however, and in an update he was able to write himself 10 days after launching the GoFundMe, he said that the future was looking brighter.

‘We are far from out of the woods, but we have all the necessary componentry in reasonable order to be able to keep all the digits, but not the length… they’re (a) bit shorter obviously,’

‘[It’s] gonna be another six months before I can wipe my butt butt but I am very positive. 

‘I am the most lucky person alive … and if nothing goes wrong I will have fingers at the end of it on both hands.’

Of the people that have currently donated to Mr Gilbert’s fund, one saw the opportunity to crack a joke.

‘Happy to lend a hand,’ they wrote after sending through $70.

A GoFundMe asking for $200,000 was launched by Mr Gilbert to pay for the numerous surgeries he will need in order to restore 50 to 60 per cent of the lost mobility in his hands