Jay Leno suffers broken bones in motorcycle accident after garage fire
Written by on January 27, 2023
Jay Leno is reportedly recovering from a motorcycle accident last week that left him with several broken bones just months after he sustained serious burns in a fire that broke out in his Los Angeles garage.
Speaking to the Las Vegas Review-Journal, the comedian and talk show host revealed that he was knocked off his motorcycle Jan. 17 in an incident that left him with a broken collarbone, two broken ribs and two cracked kneecaps.
“But I’m OK!” Leno, 72, reportedly told the outlet. “I’m OK, I’m working. I’m working this weekend.”
The former “Tonight Show” host said he had been working on a vintage motorcycle and was testing the vehicle out when he noticed the smell of leaking gas.
“So I turned down a side street and cut through a parking lot, and unbeknownst to me, some guy had a wire strung across the parking lot but with no flag hanging from it,” Leno told the Las Vegas Review-Journal. “So, you know, I didn’t see it until it was too late. It just clothesline, me and, boom, knocked me off the bike.”
“The bike kept going, and you know how that works out,” he said.
Representatives for Leno did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The comedian reportedly said he hadn’t discussed the motorcycle accident publicly yet due to the overwhelming coverage of his recovery from his burns sustained in November.
Leno suffered serious burns to his hands and chest and third-degree burns to his face after his vintage car erupted in flames Nov. 12 in his Los Angeles garage.
In an exclusive interview on NBC’s “TODAY” show, Leno told Hoda Kotb that he had been working on his vintage 1907 White Motor Co. steam-powered car with a friend when he noticed that the vehicle’s fuel line was clogged.
Leno said he had gone underneath the vehicle to try to fix it. “And I said, ‘Blow some air through the line,’” he recalled. “Then suddenly, boom, I got a face full of gas. And then the pilot light jumped, and my face caught on fire.
“My friend pulled me out and jumped on top of me and kind of smothered the fire,” Leno said.
The comedian was taken by ambulance to a hospital and then sent to the Grossman Burn Center in Los Angeles, where he received hyperbaric treatment, an oxygen therapy that “can accelerate burn wound healing,” according to the facility’s website.
Despite the severity of his injuries, Leno returned to doing stand-up just weeks after the incident. And even after sustaining further injuries this month, the comedian appears undeterred, as he prepares for a venue debut at Encore Theater at Wynn Las Vegas for a show billed for March 31.
