YouTube star Jeff Wittek shared a new video to explain how he suffered serious injuries while filming a video last year. Wittek, 30, put some of the blame for the accident on David Dobrik‘s shoulders. In the new video, Wittek said he and his fellow vloggers tried to make a funny video where they swung from an excavator in a lake, and Dobrik, 24, was behind the wheel of the heavy construction equipment.
While Wittek swung from a harness dangling from the excavator’s arm, it was clear the machine was moving too fast. At one point, Wittek was swinging almost parallel to the water. The footage shows Wittek crashing into the water, with his leg still stuck in the rope. Wittek claims Dobrik was driving the excavator during the accident. Wittek suffered damage to his face and skull, which is why he titled the video “How I Broke My Face.” The clip is part of his documentary series Don’t Try This At Home.
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TW: I’ve never felt so angry at a dumb ass influencer before. David Dobrik needs to be stopped. He’s always been irresponsible at his friends expense for YOUTUBE videos. He COULD have been charged with manslaughter had Jeff been inches closer to the excavator. IM LIVIDDDDD pic.twitter.com/eT2wEde46k
— Kat (@katmauvearts) April 22, 2021
“I just jumped out of a plane 20 times. What’s the worst that could happen if I swing from a rope over a one-foot-deep lake?” Wittek explained in the clip. “And yeah, I didn’t know I was going to go that fast so I grabbed the f—king rope and I tried to make a goddamn funny video for people but this is where I made a mistake. I forgot the biggest f—king idiot I know was driving it.”
Other vloggers commented on the accident. One noted that it looked like the “whole side” of Wittek’s face was “just open.” Another said there was no one at the scene who “could do anything to stop it.” Dobrik commented that time “literally slowed down” at the time of the accident. Wittek released the first part of his Don’t Try This at Home series on Sunday and is expected to release the third part soon.
Wittek hinted that something serious happened to him in a June 2020 Instagram post, but did not share details at the time, notes E! News. He shared a photo and video from the hospital at the time, showing his bruised right eye. “Sorry I haven’t posted any new pics of the mullet this week,” he wrote at the time. “I got in an accident and broke my face and skull in a few places. But I’m OK. I’m more alive than ever. I’ll heal up good as new, and I’ll get some new pics of that mullet up as soon as they can get me a blow dryer up to my hospital room.”
David Dobrik was swinging Jeff Wittek around while driving the excavator with ONE hand. He has his camera in the other hand filming him. What the hell pic.twitter.com/1QeDDoaA38
— jamieeee (@jamiejerwa) April 22, 2021
This is the latest controversy for Dobrik. Last month, he began to lose sponsors after a woman claimed she was sexually assaulted by his former colleague Dominykas Zeglaitis in November 2018. Dobrik has also been accused of mocking and abusing other collaborators in the past. He has already published two apology videos, first on March 16 and another on March 22. “I want to be able to do this — to shoot directly to the camera and just talk to you guys,” he said in the March 22 video. “I have put myself in a lot of situations where I have needed to apologize for my past actions, and I have never done this correctly and never done this respectfully. My last video is a testament to that. I don’t want to defend that video, I don’t want to delete that video.”
