McCallion
Quest
Are Professional Sports Safe Enough For Fans?
By Ryan Meadwell
Imagine sitting behind the goalie about 15 rows up at an NHL hockey game when a puck was deflected into the crowd. 6 ounces of hard frozen rubber puck which can travel at up to speeds of 100mph, is coming at your head. What do you do? Your first instinct would be to move but your first instinct may be too late.
Are you scared, or frightened of this thought? Well, you have just relived the moment and sat in the same seat as Brittanie Cecil. On Saturday March 13th Brittanie was attending an NHL game with her father when she was struck in the head by a puck. She died two days later. “The puck struck her forehead, causing a skull fracture and some bruising of the brain area”, said Dr. Lewis, who performed the autopsy on Brittanie. “But that wasn’t what led to her death. It was the snapping back of the head and the damage to the artery.”
Although the death of Brittanie Cecil was the first such fan fatality in the history of the NHL, other professional or junior hockey games have seen similar tragedies occur. Another incident happened two years ago when Chad Hildebrand was at a senior men’s hockey league game in Winnipeg, Manitoba when a puck flew into the crowd and glanced off a friend’s head before hitting Chad in the temple. He went home and fell into a coma. After a week, he was taken off life support and died.
His father Nick said, “A freak incident is a meteor falling out of the sky and striking you. I call this a preventable accident.”
“We believe our buildings are safe and history overwhelmingly has proven us right. We have entertained hundreds of millions of spectators over our 85 seasons and we are devastated that this tragic accident took place”, said NHL spokesman Frank Brown. Ever since the Brittanie Cecil incident occurred, the NHL has been looking into possible precautions, aimed at improving the safety of its fans.
However, the precautions, that the NHL are thinking about, just aren’t going to work in today’s game and, with the cost of tickets where they are now, many of the suggestions just won’t fly with the owners. The NHL has discussed putting up a net that does not allow pucks to fly into the crowd. But that would disturb the view of the fans. Thus there would not be as many people coming to the games. If people stopped coming to the games, or stopped buying those high priced tickets, teams would lose money, effectively putting the net idea out of the question.
There is only 8 feet of plexi-glass and the height of the boards can range anywhere from 40-48 inches high. So, at any one time, there is anywhere from 11-12 feet of protection from flying pucks. You would think that if you’re sitting right at the boards or under the protection of the glass you’re safe. Although you may think so, there is still a chance of getting hurt. Look at the amount of times this year that the glass shattered or popped out.
Jim Elliot, a Michigan attorney who has represented fans injured at games said, “It won’t be long before teams realize that it’s cheaper to put up nets and higher break-resistant glass to protect fans.”
There have been other incidents like the one that occurred to Brittanie Cecil in other professional sports games. Baseball’s Hall of Fame records showed at least five spectator deaths caused by thrown balls. One incident in particular occurred in 1970 when a 14 year old boy, named Alan Fish, was struck by a ball at a Los Angeles Dodgers game.
Brittanie Cecil’s death has reminded all of us that being at a professional sports event can be very dangerous and may in fact be even deadly. Although professional sports are now looking into more protection for the fans, it is sad that it took them so long to recognize that people can get hurt in their arenas and ballparks. What’s worse though, is the fact that they only started to think about fan safety after the death of Brittanie Cecil