August 30, 2015

Death by falling.

1, "Kyle Jean-Baptiste, the first African-American actor to play the iconic lead role of Jean Valjean in the popular Broadway musical 'Les Misérables,' died on Friday after falling from a fire escape in Brooklyn. He was 21.... The police said that Mr. Jean-Baptiste’s death 'appeared to be accidental.' They said he fell from the fourth-floor fire escape of an apartment in the Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood of Brooklyn. Mr. Jean-Baptiste was sitting on the fire escape with a 23-year-old female friend, the police said, when he stood up, slipped and fell backward to the street below."

2. "A man in his early 60s died Saturday night after falling more than 40 feet from the upper deck at Turner Field during the seventh inning of the Yankees’ 3-1 win over the Atlanta Braves.... According to eyewitnesses, a middle-aged man wearing a Braves cap stood up from his seat in the second row behind home plate to boo the Yankees’ Alex Rodriguez when he was announced as a pinch-hitter. The man then seemed to lose his balance and fell forward over several women who were seated in the front row. He landed on a concrete walkway in the lower bowl of the stadium, not far from where family members of Yankees and Braves players were sitting."

23 comments:

Beloved Commenter AReasonableMan said...

A-Rod should be prosecuted for murder, or at lest manslaughter. If he wasn't such an a-hole this tragedy would have been averted.

bbkingfish said...

Thank you for posting this Sunday morning chum. Trying to induce some death-snark from the Peanut Gallery on the Sabbath, huh?

What a great public service.

You must be one of those extremely sensible, and decent, midwesterners I keep reading about.

Sydney said...

It's not the fall that kills you; it's the meeting with the ground.

Unknown said...

Gravity is a bitch.

Snark said...

This recent was-it-suicide-or-was-it-accidental was strange: http://t.thestar.com/#/article/news/gta/2015/08/06/chris-hyndmans-mother-believes-he-died-sleepwalking.html

traditionalguy said...

He was drunk on hate. And then he had one too many beers on top of that...Not good for keeping one's balance.

Should we put up a pile of teddy bears and flowers, or a warning sign that hatred is a football value not allowed in Baseball?

Clyde said...

I blame the absence of the DH in the National League. If A-Rod had been in the lineup from the beginning of the game, the man might have gotten the booing out of his system before the seventh inning. I don't know, but I suspect alcohol might have been a factor. Sober booing is less likely to lead to a fall.

Bob Boyd said...

Like so many before, he didn't like A-Rod, but in the end, fell for him.

sane_voter said...

I went to the Atlanta Journal Constituion article on the incident, trying to get more details on the upper deck railing. Many commenters there wrote that the railing seems too low for the steep pitch of the upper level section, and that it makes them nervous to sit near it. It is 3'6" high, which is per code, but is that adequate for an upper desk scenario where the momentum from a fall makes it easier to flip over the barrier.

sane_voter said...

upper deck scenario

Birches said...

I'm guessing alcohol was a factor in both deaths...

Gahrie said...

The police said that Mr. Jean-Baptiste’s death 'appeared to be accidental.

Sure it was. I bet some disgruntles French man, pissed off by the cultural appropriation, pushed him on purpose.

rhhardin said...

Falling is the only way things can happen.

You don't see them coming, otherwise they would just be a continuation, not a happening.

Befall.

I Have Misplaced My Pants said...

A 21 year old Jean Valjean!?

Larry J said...

"Blogger sydney said...
It's not the fall that kills you; it's the meeting with the ground."

Gravity isn't just a good idea, it's the law. As we paratroopers used to say, it isn't the fall that kills you, it's the sudden stop at the end. You can fall for mikes and not get a scratch. It's the last 1/4 inch that does the job.

Etienne said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
William said...

I just hope that this unfortunate accident doesn't inhibit the further booing of Alex Rodriguez. That would be the wrong moral to draw.

Biff said...

I was in the upper deck at a concert recently, and a member of my group tripped over someone's shoes while finding his seat. His fall caused a chain reaction, and several people rolled down three or four rows before stopping. If we were a little closer to the lip of the deck, it could have been tragic. Between the steep pitch of the deck and the very short distance between rows, it's actually surprising that serious injuries don't happen more often, especially at sporting events, where the upper deck crowd can get pretty inebriated and unruly.

MayBee said...

The death of Kyle Jean-Baptiste is so sad!

Valentine Smith said...

Nobody "slips" backward. The girl killed him.

I'm Full of Soup said...

I was in the front row of the Hall of Fame section seats at Citizens Bank Park in Philly on Thursday night. This section is in the 2nd level just above the infield bowl seats - I was surprised the railing was maybe 24-27 inches high if that. I think the railing is low so it does not obstruct the views and the rows are not real steep.

HoodlumDoodlum said...

The steps/rows at the upper deck of Turner are quite steep. The fan landed behind home plate near where the player's families sit--Brian McCann's mom is an RN and gave the guy aid.

caplight45 said...

"A man in his early 60s died Saturday night after falling more than 40 feet..."

"According to eyewitnesses, a middle-aged man wearing a Braves cap stood up from his seat..."

I am grateful that those of us in our "early 60s" can be described as "middle aged." Perhaps the professor (six months my senior) will also take heart in that.