Steve Irwin injury video

[injuryupdate]

This would be a good video if we can get hold of it:

Irwin death footage 'terrible' (from SMH)

The underwater video footage of Steve Irwin's death after he was speared in the chest by a stingray was "shocking" his manager reportedly said today.

John Stainton told reporters the footage, which he had handed to police, was the worst thing he had ever seen, Sydney's 2GB radio reported this morning.

"I have seen the footage and it's shocking," Mr Stainton said.

"It's a very hard thing to watch because you're watching somebody die and it's terrible."

Mr Stainton, also a producer and director of Irwin's popular television shows, said the footage showed Mr Irwin pulling the barb out of his chest before losing consciousness.

'The tail came up'

"It shows that Steve came over the top of the ray and the tail came up, and spiked him here (in the chest), and he pulled it out and the next minute he's gone.

"That was it. The cameraman had to shut down."

Mr Stainton, who was aboard Mr Irwin's vessel Croc One when the tragedy occurred, said it was likely the television star and naturalist died almost immediately as a result of the stingray's blow.

"(He was) probably a metre coming over the top of it," he said.

"He was underwater. I think, and the coroner's report will say what happened, but I think he died fairly instantly."

Mr Stainton said he was still in disbelief that a stingray could claim his close friend's life.

"He was always on the precipice," he said.

"He always pushed himself to the very limits but I thought he was invulnerable and I think he did too.

Close shaves

"I think we all had that belief that we'd pull through whatever situation we were in and he has been in some very close shaves with snakes and crocodiles.

"I would never imagine it to come from something like a stingray."

A post-mortem examination has confirmed Irwin died after being speared in the chest by a stingray's poisonous barb.

"We're not going into the detail but there's definitely no surprises. Everyone knows how he died," a police spokeswoman said.

Mr Stainton said Irwin's crew was struggling to come to terms with the death.

"Devastated," Mr Stainton said when asked at a news conference in Cairns today how Mr Irwin's crew was coping with the loss.

[Nicholas]

Yes it would!!! But it would impossible.

The footage of Steve Irwin's death should be destroyed, his manager and friend John Stainton said today.

"I would never want that tape shown," Stainton told CNN talk show host Larry King.

"It should be destroyed.

"At the moment it is in police custody for evidence. There's a coroner's inquest taking place at the moment.

"When that is finally released it will never see the light of day.

"Never. Ever.

"I actually saw it and I don't want to see it again."

Irwin, 44, died on Monday when he was stabbed in the chest by a stingray barb while snorkelling on the Great Barrier Reef and Stainton has said footage of the incident is "terrible".

The footage shows Irwin pulling the barb out of his chest before dying.

While Stainton wants the footage kept under wraps, media experts say it might soon be circulating on the internet.

"The key point is once there's something on film, it's impossible to keep it contained," said Paul Levinson, chairman of Fordham University's Department of Communication and Media Studies.

Stainton, who broke down several times during the CNN interview, said Irwin's wife, Terri, was struggling with her husband's death.

When King asked Stainton how Terri was doing, he replied: "A lot worse than me."

Stainton told how he travelled with Irwin's body in a casket on a seaplane from Cairns to Irwin's family on Queensland's Sunshine Coast yesterday.

"We brought him home last night because he has been in Cairns," Stainton said.

"I travelled on the plane with him for six hours, just him and I. For five hours I couldn't stop crying. It was devastating."

When Irwin's family saw the casket, it brought a sense of reality that the larger than life Irwin had died, he said.

"The fact that we finally got him home and the family saw the casket last night, it was like a full stop," he said.

"Until you actually see that you can't imagine it.

"You think it's a dream and it's not happening. But it is and it has and it's done."

Stainton said the family was still too distressed to decide when Irwin's funeral would take place.

The Irwin family has been offered a state funeral.

"We haven't worked it out yet," he said.

"We can't even get to it.

"Just listening to his voice. It's just hard."

I though I'd found it on YouTube a few times but I did not. Has anyone got it?