Greek Teen Injured by Easter Bell

A 14-year-old boy on the Greek island of Crete was slightly injured and hospitalized after being hit by a bell clapper, the semi-state Athens News Agency reported on Sunday.

The clapper broke and fell on the boy as the bell was ringing to celebrate Orthodox Easter at a village church near the island capital of Iraklio late on Saturday, ANA said.

Church bells are rung and fireworks are set off across Greece around midnight ahead of Easter Sunday to mark the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

The manufacture of firecrackers for Easter is a decades-old tradition common in many areas in rural Greece which causes several injuries every year, in addition to occasional deaths.

On Thursday, two brothers aged 21 and 25 were injured in an explosion while attempting to craft fireworks in a shed in the Peloponnese district of Mani.

One lost three fingers, the other two.