TROY, N.Y. (NEWS10) – A disturbing realization for a New York man who just wanted to cool off on a hot day.
“Popped it open, took a big swig, and it felt like grit or sand in my teeth,” Robert Borter said.
Borter tried to drink a Snapple Peach Iced Tea last week, but it wasn’t sand he was feeling in his mouth.
“Looked down on my hand, I see shards of glass in my hand,” he recalled. “I look at the bottle. There’s shards on the outside of the bottle. I pick the cap up, all sorts of shards of glass inside the cap.”
Somehow several shards of glass had made it inside the cap of the drink even though the bottle itself wasn’t broken at all.
“It wasn’t until after I seen the shards of glass I realized I swallowed glass,” Borter said.
Borter began to worry.
“When I saw those big shards, I started getting nervous,” he said. “Naturally, at first, I’m like, it can’t be good swallowing glass.”
Borter reported the issue to Snapple and went to the emergency room. NEWS10 ABC reporter Ayla Ferrone also called Snapple and spoke with Corporate Communications Director Chris Barnes over the phone.
“Our primary concern is always the safety and well-being of our consumers,” he said.
Barnes said there are extensive safety precautions taken on the production line to ensure such incidents don’t take place. He told NEWS10 that Snapple would be reaching out to Borter.
“We’re certainly sorry he had the experience he did with our product, and we want to attend to his needs,” Barnes said.
A week later, Borter said he’s still in shock about what happened. He hopes no one else has to experience what he did.
“Ninety degree day, you just want to cool off, take a big swig, and next thing you know, you realize you swallowed glass,” he said. “It cut the back of my throat. My throat still bothers me today. It’s been a week.”
Barnes said another safety measure the company uses is to clean every bottle before it’s filled to ensure no objects such as glass are in the bottles. He also said that when there is a break on the line, all the glass is cleared along with any bottles that may have come in contact with broken glass.
Borter hasn’t had any serious health issues because of the incident. His doctor said there is an 80 percent chance he’ll be okay after ingesting the glass.
Barnes sent the following statement to NEWS10 Monday night:
We’re looking forward to connecting with Mr. Borter and addressing his needs and concerns. Nothing is more important to us than the safety and well being of our consumers. While it’s difficult to speculate on how this issue happened without analyzing the product and reviewing the production records based on the code printed on the bottle, I wanted to reiterate that we have extensive measures in place related to our glass bottling operations. As I mentioned earlier, bottles are inverted and air rinsed with deionized air shortly before filling. It’s virtually impossible for anything to enter the bottle at that point. Further, if there is a breakage on the line, production stops immediately and we clear the lines, removing all product near that breakage as a precaution.