A woman impaled herself on a rake - but the garden tool was too long for the ambulance that came to take her to Tauranga Hospital.
The Te Puke woman, thought to be in her 20s, was walking through the garage at her Glen Tce home when she stood on therake about 1.45pm yesterday.
A St John ambulance was called to take her to hospital.
But the length of the rake meant the woman was unable to fit in the ambulance while the rake was still lodged in her foot.
Te Puke volunteer fire brigade was called to cut the rake so it would fit.
Fire chief Glenn Williams described the rake as "vicious looking, with fairly sharp prongs".
"She was certainly in pain when we got there," he said.
"The ambulance guys gave her some pain relief and we were careful to use as little disturbance as possible in cutting it, but there still would have been some movement."
Mr Williams said they cut as much of the rake off as they could.
The incident was a first for the brigade, he said.
"We have been to a few calls but I can't think of any where we have had someone impaled like this."
The ordeal of cutting the rake only took a few seconds, Mr Williams said.
The woman was put on a stretcher and eventually loaded into the ambulance, after emergency workers contended with a steep driveway in slippery conditions.
