Texting teenager plunges to his death
Family blames multi-storey car park
An Australian teenager has died after he fell from a multi-storey car park while typing a text message.
19-year-old Ryan Robbins escorted a couple of women to their car late last Friday, in Melbourne. After they parted ways, Ryan began texting a friend, while walking.
He did not notice the railing - about waist-high - and tripped over, plunging to his death. Ryan had been drinking but was not drunk, according to his grandmother Patricia Schroeter.
In an interview with the radio station 3AW, she blamed inadequate safety measures at the car park for Ryan's death and called for taller barriers to be mandatory.
"I don't want anyone else to lose their children or… to go like this, not if it can be prevented," she said.
According to local reports, Australian building regs require one metre-high safety barriers in multi-level buildings.
A bill is impending in New York that seeks to ban the use of iPods and mobile phones while crossing the road. Mind you, Democratic State Senator Carl Kruger has been trying to get this on the statute books since 2007.
In Australia, the New South Wales Police is gunning for similar restrictions, in response to what it calls a "Death by iPod" epidemic. ®
COMMENTS
Can I coin the term
'Assisted selection' for when technology and stupidity combine with fatal results?
Or have i been beaten to the punch?
I believe this is what they call
an accident. Regrettable, tragic for those involved, but not indicative of any need to further regulate, control or amend. As long as there are tall buildings, people will accidentally fall off them. It's sad, but it's not possible or sensible to try to legislate against it.
FFS
Why can't people be responsible for what they do? They'll be calling for the mandatory lowering of cliffs next.
Did it say what height his is?
The centre of gravity of a human is neutrally the navel. In guys it's slightly higher than ladies (more shoulder, less hip). If he was texting, he would have raised his arms. Each of these things raises his centre of gravity.
He may also have been wearing a backpack. If it had a laptop in it, that's a lot of added mass to raise the centre of gravity.
The grandmother says the rail was waist-high, so he was clearly a tall bloke.
A safety railing only prevents accidental falls if it is higher than the centre of gravity. The population is getting taller, so maybe it is time to raise the limit to account for this.
And as for tripping...
Well most car parks have kerbs, right? Even if not a full pavement kerb, those little ones to stop the wheels getting too close to the walls So it's possible he tripped on a kerb or other obstacle *before* hitting the rail? The article doesn't go into detail.
And, to be fair, it shouldn't HAVE to go into detail. What sort of person reads a news story about an accident and starts publically slagging off the person without full possession of the facts?
What sort of person?
I would tell you, but I think Sarah would be obliged to censor it.
That's why
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-12380329
That's why.
You cannot expect people to be responsible when you prohibit kids to become responsible by law and punish every parent that tries to instill even the most elementary sense of danger and responsibility in them.
