A five-year-old girl has been left with life-changing scars after a boiling hot bowl of ramen was accidentally poured over her face.
Now, the US-born toddler's mother is issuing a warning to fellow parents over the risk of leaving children exposed to hot food.
Mum-of-five Amber Peters had been folding laundry in the bedroom of her Missouri home earlier this month, whilst her children played together downstairs.
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Within a matter of minutes, however, the 34-year-old heard a 'blood curdling' scream from downstairs.
It was only until she ran into her family kitchen that she discovered the source of the horror.
Amber's 12-year-old daughter Nahla had accidentally poured an entire bowl of piping hot ramen all over her youngest daughter Brixx, five, causing the tot's face to start 'melting off'.
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She had been removing the food from the microwave when her toddler sister had plummeted into her whilst chasing their brother, causing her to spill the contents onto her head and face.
"Nahla screamed and then I heard a blood curdling scream come from my five-year-old and a cry and you never hear this sound unless they are badly hurt," Amber said.
"When I heard this, I jumped up and ran in there and I found her in pure pain and screaming. I looked at her skin and it had already started to melt off her face.
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"I screamed and I couldn't stop as it was just so shocking what I was looking at and knew then how bad of a situation it was."
Stomach-wrenching photos from the incident show the tot's red raw face and ear, exposing her flesh, which were later diagnosed as second-degree burns.
The traumatised mother immediately dialled an ambulance, which transported the youngster to her local ER where she was quickly sedated before being transferred to Springfield Burn Center at Mercy Hospital.
It was there that Brixx's dead skin was removed by doctors with the hope of ascertaining how severe her burns were.
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"My daughter is half black," Amber said. "I could tell the skin was melting off her face because she had a lot of melanin in her face and the brown part was melting off and it revealed white skin underneath.
"It was like a light pink underneath but the skin peeling off was brown."
Recalling medics' verdicts, she went on: "They said based on how she heals this will depend on if she will need a skin graft but we are hoping she won't."
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The following day, Brixx was sent home, only to be retuned straight to the hospital hours later when her condition declined and her eyes became swollen shut.
"This was caused by the fluid from the burns and the plasma," Amber explained. "Your body naturally produces plasma and it leaks this when you are burnt but if you don't wipe this away as it drips, it builds up."
It was then that she underwent a CAT scan, revealing that she'd suffered significant facial tissue damage, after which the toddler was given antibiotics and an ointment to apply to her burns.
"As a mum it's devastating as you can't prevent the inevitable," Amber said.
"Accidents happen every day and I don't want parents to think it can't happen to them but I also don't want them [parents] to guilt themselves into thinking it's their fault.
"There was nothing I could have done to prevent this apart from maybe not letting my 12-year-old daughter make her own ramen.
"This is now a rule in my house. We will now make all our hot food in the house for all our kids no matter their age.
"In terms of warning other parents, I want to tell them to not blame themselves as accidents happen every day but I do want to say to just be more wary of even the smallest things that can transpire in the blink of an eye."
Rhianna Benson