CENTRAL PARK — Friends of the college student who lost his foot to a set of homemade fireworks in Central Park have set up a GoFundMe page for his medical bills and have already raised more than $38,000.
Connor Golden, who is a 19-year-old student at the University of Miami, was visiting the park with his friends on July 3, when he jumped down from a rock near East 60th Street and Fifth Avenue shortly before 11 a.m. and landed on a set of fireworks, triggering an explosion.
Police suspect the fireworks were put there as some sort of experiment and were not meant to harm anyone, but Golden's leg had to be amputated just below the knee, according to the GoFundMe page.
The parents of the Oakton High School chorus in Virginia, where Golden is from, started the fund to help with medical costs, which are expected to reach as much as $50,000, according to the page.
Almost 500 people have already given toward the fund, which had already surpassed $38,000 as of Tuesday afternoon.
Golden is an adventurer, who enjoys hiking, rock climbing, snow skiing and windsurfing, his parents said in a statement released to ABC News.
"We are saddened that, on a weekend to celebrate our nation's freedoms, he suffered a loss of limb and the associated freedom to pursue these and other endeavors," they wrote.
