‘The Walking Dead’: Is Rebar Actually Sharp Enough to Have Impaled Rick Grimes?

The Walking Dead fans are skeptical of Rick’s fate from the end of Sunday night’s episode, calling on post-apocalyptic science for answers.

Spoilers for The Walking Dead Episode 9×04 follow. Major spoilers!

To conclude Rick Grimes‘ penultimate episode of The Walking Dead, the character was bucked off of a horse directly onto a rebar. The rebar didn’t scratch him before bouncing him off, though. The rebar sliced through Rick Grimes like a knife through melting butter, protruding from his abdomen and causing him to leak blood on the side of the street. However, some fans are thinking that because the rebar wasn’t pointed, this shouldn’t have been the case.

“It’s been kind of a trope in movies and TV for characters to get impaled by rebar but it just makes no sense to me cause half the time, the tip of the rebar isnt even sharp,” user strimes23 writes in The Walking Dead‘s subreddit. “It’s just a flat end of a metal cylinder, yet media treats it like it’s a spear.”

A search through the United States Department of Labor, however, reveals that being impaled by rebar is an event which occurs all too often. Most recently, an employee was impaled by a rebar on September 20, 2017, with the description reading, “employee drilling rock slips and is impaled by rebar.” Just over a year prior, another “work [was] impaled by exposed rebar.” Between 2012 and 2017, there were no incidents according to the Department of Labor.

In fact, steps are taken in work environments to prevent such accidents from happening according to another Reddit user. “It’s not sharp, but it’s only 5/8″ or 3/4″ thick generally when used in concrete. That’s why on constructions sites, they have plastic caps that the put on the end if they are sticking up,” one user wrote. “I work around it all the time, I have very little doubt that if you fell off a horse onto a rebar like that, it would impale you quite easily.”

While rebar accidents seem uncommon in the workplace, with only 15 being reported under a “rebar” and “impaled” search from the Department of Labor between 2004 and today, that’s because steps are taken to avoid such events. Clearly, though, being impaled by rebar is something which has happened in the real world, therefore lending credibility to Rick Grimes’ accident when falling off of a horse in The Walking Dead Episode 9×04.

The Walking Dead airs Sundays at 9 pm ET. Fear the Walking Dead will return for its fifth season in 2019. For complete coverage and insider info all year long, follow @BrandonDavisBD on Twitter and watch ComicBook.com’s After The Dead each Sunday night following new episodes.