They were using Electrical equipment and apparently "There was a minor accident" and it "malfunctioned"
The penis was burnt off completely, leaving like a string of burned flesh. Soon after he was castrated and attempted to be 'reassigned' a gender.
I watched the documentary last night.
The psychologist who persuaded David's parents to make him a girl was called Dr Money. He wanted to use the Reimer case as a paradigm to prove his theory that sexual identity was neutral until the age of two and that before that time, you could raise a male as a girl and he would take on feminine characteristics, and become a female in every way except of course for the penis. Why the age of two, I have no idea.
In his interviews with the Reimer children (they were male twins) he would graphically explain to David or Brenda as she was called, the difference between boys and girls. He used some really extreme and paedophilic (to me) methods.
Such as, showing the children graphic pictures of women giving birth. Getting the children to strip naked and look at each other's privates. He photographed that. In the last interview, he brought a transexual in. That was to try and convince David to have a vagina built.
After that last interview, David said if he had to see Dr Money again he would kill himself. That's when his parents told him the truth (he was 13) and he decided to live as a male. He also had a son or sons too...I don't know how.
Sadly, he commited suicide when he was 38.
One reason why circumcision is bad. It's completely unnecessary and mistakes can happen, and have severe consequences.