Firefighters Rescue Ohio Woman 'Molded' to Chair

Barbara Foster, 75, may have been in it since last July
By Linda Hervieux,  Newser Staff
Posted Feb 20, 2017 7:16 AM CST
Firefighters Rescue Ohio Woman 'Molded' to Chair
EMS workers removed Barbara Foster from her home last week.   (WTOL)

Firefighters in Ohio got a shock last week when they were called to the home of a 550-pound woman who was stuck in a chair in her house, the Toledo Blade reports. Barbara Foster, 75, was "molded" to the chair and surrounded by excrement when firefighters wearing Hazmat suits entered the Springfield Township house, WTOL reports. The 5-foot, 5 inch-woman apparently hadn't moved from the chair since July, a sheriff's department report says. She "was so physically weak that bones in her body were breaking" during the rescue, per the police report. A man from Foster's church called 911 after he thought she was acting out of sorts. He had delivered food to Foster for 10 years and says he had become accustomed to the stench, which EMS workers said was overwhelming.

While neighbors said they watched out for one another, nobody apparently noticed that anything was amiss at the Foster home. Her next-door neighbor of 10 years says he used to wave to Foster while he mowed his grass. "It’s been years since I’ve physically seen her," he tells the Blade. Another tells WTOL that Foster was a "hoarder" and that she wanted to call the Fire Department "for years" to report the house as a fire hazard. "I should have done it," she says. Foster was taken to a hospital where her condition was not released. Meanwhile, health authorities planned to visit her home to determine if it was safe for her to return. (The world's heaviest woman was recently moved to India by cargo plane and crane.)

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