Straight Dope Message Board

[k9bfriender]

Story here.

So, terrible way to die, but I don't understand how this could have happened. The article speculates about the seats maybe tilting forward due to a recall issue, but I still don't see how that could trap and kill an able bodied near adult.

[carnivorousplant]

While googling "Kyle Plush", I had a ad come up. "These new crossover SUVs will take your breath away."
Jesus.

[Barbarian]

From another article on that site:

Kyle Plush died while trying to retrieve tennis equipment from the back of his minivan and was pinned by the rear bench seat, a law enforcement source with knowledge of the situation told the Enquirer.

The 2002 Odyssey has three rows of seating. Bucket seats are in the first two rows and a third row is a bench seat.

According to the source, Plush had climbed onto the back seat and was reaching over the seat into the back hatch to retrieve his tennis gear. The seat then flipped up and over toward the back hatch, pinning him upside down beneath the seat.

So it sounds like he was pinned upside down and did not have the leverage to get out, perhaps with his legs over the seat.

[muldoonthief]

I had one of those vans. The entire back row bench is designed to fold up (the upright section against the seating section), then pivot into the storage well in the floor behind it. When you set it back up, the seating section has hooks that are supposed to lock into corresponding bars in the floor. The problem is that lots of time they don't lock, so the seat looks like it's OK, but you could easily push the whole thing back into the well, without folding the upright section back first. If he was kneeling on the seat, and reaching behind it to get stuff in the well, his upper body could have gotten trapped in the well, with the entire weight of the seat (a lot) holding him down. He wouldn't have had any leverage to push the seat away from him and get out, especially if his legs were pinned against the back hatch of the van.

ETA: Here's a video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ynV9ahaEltc showing how to fold down the back seats. If he was leaning over the back of the larger seat, and it folded forward unexpectedly, I can definitely see how he could get trapped.

[carnivorousplant]

nm

[Machine Elf]

Originally Posted by muldoonthief

If he was kneeling on the seat, and reaching behind it to get stuff in the well, his upper body could have gotten trapped in the well, with the entire weight of the seat (a lot) holding him down. He wouldn't have had any leverage to push the seat away from him and get out, especially if his legs were pinned against the back hatch of the van.

Thanks for the video link. From watching that, I'm assuming the seatbacks were upright when he leaned over them. If he had his chest laying over the top of the seatback when the whole assembly pivoted rearward, his rib cage would have been pinned against the rear hatch, with his own body weight pushing the whole thing downward. With the angle of movement relative to the rear hatch, a given amount of weight would have resulted in a substantially larger compressive force on his rib cage. He might have been able to use his arms to push away from the floor and temporarily relieve the pressure on his ribs, but not enough to free himself. A miserable way to die.

[Whiskey Dickens]

7 minutes go by before the 911 dispatcher contacts the Police??! God damn it!

[Tom Tildrum]

Originally Posted by Machine Elf

Thanks for the video link. From watching that, I'm assuming the seatbacks were upright when he leaned over them. If he had his chest laying over the top of the seatback when the whole assembly pivoted rearward, his rib cage would have been pinned against the rear hatch, with his own body weight pushing the whole thing downward. With the angle of movement relative to the rear hatch, a given amount of weight would have resulted in a substantially larger compressive force on his rib cage. He might have been able to use his arms to push away from the floor and temporarily relieve the pressure on his ribs, but not enough to free himself. A miserable way to die.

Vaguely like the crucifixion of St. Peter. That poor kid. How terrifying.

[k9bfriender]

Originally Posted by carnivorousplant

While googling "Kyle Plush", I had a ad come up. "These new crossover SUVs will take your breath away."
Jesus.

I was seeing South Park merchandise.

Originally Posted by Machine Elf

Thanks for the video link. From watching that, I'm assuming the seatbacks were upright when he leaned over them. If he had his chest laying over the top of the seatback when the whole assembly pivoted rearward, his rib cage would have been pinned against the rear hatch, with his own body weight pushing the whole thing downward. With the angle of movement relative to the rear hatch, a given amount of weight would have resulted in a substantially larger compressive force on his rib cage. He might have been able to use his arms to push away from the floor and temporarily relieve the pressure on his ribs, but not enough to free himself. A miserable way to die.

That makes more sense. I heard about this, and was trying to figure out how that could happen, but if his own weight is also contributing to the weight pinning him, I can see that being hard to get out of.

I wonder how many times this has happened that had a more fortunate ending that didn't make the news.

Not just a miserable way to die, a very slow way too.

[Machine Elf]

Originally Posted by k9bfriender

Not just a miserable way to die, a very slow way too.

Yup. Can't breathe, so you push off with your arms. Arms get tired, you have to relax them, ribs get squeezed and then can't breathe. Arms recover a bit, you push off and breathe some more. Eventually your arms are too whipped to push off anymore, your ribs get squeezed, you can't breathe and you're powerless to stop it.

[Darren Garrison]

Update. (Still dead.)

[aceplace57]

This was exactly the type of emergency 911 was supposed to respond too.

The victim gave them pretty good information about the car and location.

It appears 911 didn't forward enough information to the first responders.

What a senseless and preventable way to die.

[k9bfriender]

Originally Posted by aceplace57

This was exactly the type of emergency 911 was supposed to respond too.

The victim gave them pretty good information about the car and location.

It appears 911 didn't forward enough information to the first responders.

What a senseless and preventable way to die.

If the 911 operator dropped the ball on this, she needs to be charged with something.

It could have been a technology failure, but it really seems like she just didn't take the call seriously, and just walked away from it, using the excuse of what she considered a prank call to take a break. Complete speculation on my part for that last bit, but from the article, it doesn't seem that improbable.

[gnoitall]

Originally Posted by k9bfriender

If the 911 operator dropped the ball on this, she needs to be charged with something.

It could have been a technology failure, but it really seems like she just didn't take the call seriously, and just walked away from it, using the excuse of what she considered a prank call to take a break. Complete speculation on my part for that last bit, but from the article, it doesn't seem that improbable.

Is there confirmation that this 911 system wasn't an E-911 with cell phone autolocation capability? The kid was calling from a cell phone. Any 911 technology from this millennium would have been able to triangulate quickly to within a few dozen yards.

This should not have been a laborious search that the police felt free to give up on. A gold minivan. How stealthy is that?

[Joey P]

Originally Posted by k9bfriender

If the 911 operator dropped the ball on this, she needs to be charged with something.

It could have been a technology failure, but it really seems like she just didn't take the call seriously, and just walked away from it, using the excuse of what she considered a prank call to take a break. Complete speculation on my part for that last bit, but from the article, it doesn't seem that improbable.

It's my understanding that even if it was a prank call, they would still send officers out there. I don't think the operator is allowed to not send officers out to a prank call. It's not up to them to make that decision.

If everything is taken at face value or even if the details are a little wrong, ISTM, the officers simply couldn't find him fast enough.
I can understand that it may be difficult to find a car, in a parking lot at or near a school, while school is letting out. On top of that, it sounds like during the first time the officers went out, they didn't know exactly what they were looking for. To top it all off, he was, I assume, below the window line way in the back. Even in the middle of the day, it's going to mean going up to every car and directly looking into it. I'd assume the van had tinted rear windows as well.

I'm sure someone will be blamed for this and it sounds like it's going to be one or both of the 911 operators. Even if they did do something wrong, I'm still willing to bet, that if everything played out the way it did, but he called 911 a little earlier or survived a little longer, the facts would be very different.
Similarly, I'd be willing to bet that if everything played out exactly as it did, but the officers found him on time, everyone involved would be a hero.

[Joey P]

Originally Posted by gnoitall

This should not have been a laborious search that the police felt free to give up on. A gold minivan. How stealthy is that?

I agree, but have you ever driven around in a high school parking lot at 3-3:30. There's a lot of cars moving around. One article I read mentioned that the school actually hired an extra officer just to direct traffic at the end of the day, due to the amount of cars trying to leave the school.
However, that's probably also due to the amount of those cars being driven my kids with very little experience. I drive through a high school area twice in the morning and twice around 3. There's a lot of kids, many of which are clearly still learning how to drive.

[Darren Garrison]

Originally Posted by gnoitall

This should not have been a laborious search that the police felt free to give up on. A gold minivan. How stealthy is that?

According to the article that I posted today, after the first call a police officer looked around for 11 minutes and didn't find anything. It wasn't until the second call (which the 911 operator claims to have not understood but apparently the recording was clear) that he described it as a gold minivan. Which the operator didn't pass along.

There is the possibility that the first cop did see the minivan, but it looked empty. After all, if someone claimed to be stuck under the seat of their car, wouldn't you have been envisioning someone clearly visible, feet dangling out of an open door? Not someone folded away under a collapsible back seat?

[aceplace57]

I've raised and lowered folding car seats many times. They aren't difficult for even a small person to manage.

It's hard to understand how this accident occurred and why the kid got more than a bump on the head.

They reported obvious signs of struggle and he kept himself from suffocating for awhile.

I guess freak accidents will always happen. Hopefully the manufacturer can find a way to keep their car seats from killing anyone else.

[Machine Elf]

Originally Posted by aceplace57

I've raised and lowered folding car seats many times. They aren't difficult for even a small person to manage.

It's hard to understand how this accident occurred and why the kid got more than a bump on the head.

See link in post #11. Click on animation at top of page to see what investigators thing happened. This matches pretty well with what I described verbally in post #6.

[Eyebrows 0f Doom]

Originally Posted by Machine Elf

See link in post #11. Click on animation at top of page to see what investigators thing happened. This matches pretty well with what I described verbally in post #6.

I don't see an animation on that page.

[pulykamell]

Originally Posted by Eyebrows 0f Doom

I don't see an animation on that page.

The top photo has a "play" icon for me. On the desktop it autoplayed, but on the iPad, I believe I had to click on it.

[Iggy]

Keep in mind I have no specific knowledge of that particular 9-1-1 center, but I do work in the industry....

It is a common occurrence in my experience that the recording is MUCH clearer than the live call. Almost a given. So I'll give a tiny bit of slack on that point. After all playing a recording back often is through software that normalizes volume somewhat so a really quiet caller might sound loud and clear in the recording, and so on...

But many call processing software packages have a feature for immediate playback of recently completed calls. If there was any doubt then the 911 operator and his/her supervisor should be playing that back right away to glean every possible bit of detail that might help the responding personnel.

But the second call has rightly been identified as the critical error. There is absolutely no excuse for not passing along a vehicle description. Firing offence serious.

And having the phone number and vehicle make/model/color the 9-1-1 personnel should have cross referenced that information with vehicle registration and driver's license records. That likely would have led to an exact license plate number as well as contact information for his family.

With a solid vehicle description police should not have left the scene until their were satisfied they had checked every single gold van on the grounds. Unfortunately from a map view it appears there were a few parking areas and perhaps no clear information about which one the vehicle was in.


As to specific location... there are three levels of precision... Basic 911 means the 9-1-1 center gets the call but absolutely no location information from the cell phone. E911 Phase 1 gets the location of the cell tower handling the call within 6 minutes of making the request. And E911 phase 2 gets the latitude and longitude of the call within 300 meters* within 6 minutes of making the request. None of those guarantee the exact location of a specific vehicle within a parking lot, and only Phase 2 is reasonably likely to get you to the right parking lot. Not sure which standard the call center handling these calls has.

*There could be better than these margins of error. Or not.

[aceplace57]

Originally Posted by Machine Elf

See link in post #11. Click on animation at top of page to see what investigators thing happened. This matches pretty well with what I described verbally in post #6.

The animation is very helpful in understanding the accident. Thank you.

[TokyoBayer]

Originally Posted by Iggy

But the second call has rightly been identified as the critical error. There is absolutely no excuse for not passing along a vehicle description. Firing offence serious.

My experience with police dispatch is limited to working several years in campus security sharing the same radio dispatcher as the police. We could listen to their calls.

There were several dispatchers who should never have been hired and certainly should have been fired.

While it's certainly possible that a number of technical glitches occurred in this one particular call, my money is on an incompetent operator trying to cover their ass.

That's sad.

[RTFirefly]

Originally Posted by TokyoBayer

My experience with police dispatch is limited to working several years in campus security sharing the same radio dispatcher as the police. We could listen to their calls.

There were several dispatchers who should never have been hired and certainly should have been fired.

While it's certainly possible that a number of technical glitches occurred in this one particular call, my money is on an incompetent operator trying to cover their ass.

That's sad.

The original idea of 911 was that it was supposed to be the emergency number, for when crucial time might be lost if you took the time to dig the police or rescue squad numbers out of the phone book, or if you couldn't even get to a phone book on account of your situation.

But 911 evolved fairly quickly into the default number for calling the police about anything. Gotta wonder how good an idea that was. If you had a different universal number for non-emergency calls, like 919 or something like that, you could have your best operators be the ones who picked up on 911.

And surely part of the job of a 911 operator as it exists now is sorting out actual emergency calls from a much larger quantity of more routine calls. There'd still be some of that if there were a universal number for non-emergency calls, but once it got established, most of that sorting would go away, and it would be easier for the 911 operators to treat every incoming call like an emergency.

[Iggy]

Originally Posted by RTFirefly

...
And surely part of the job of a 911 operator as it exists now is sorting out actual emergency calls from a much larger quantity of more routine calls. There'd still be some of that if there were a universal number for non-emergency calls, but once it got established, most of that sorting would go away, and it would be easier for the 911 operators to treat every incoming call like an emergency.

bolding mine

<caller> But operator, it is an emergency! I cannot find my phone charger! Someone must have broken into my home to steal it even though there is absolutely no sign of forced entry! </caller>

Yes, in my experience most calls to 911 are not time critical true emergencies. A large majority.

Sigh.

[pulykamell]

Originally Posted by RTFirefly

But 911 evolved fairly quickly into the default number for calling the police about anything. Gotta wonder how good an idea that was. If you had a different universal number for non-emergency calls, like 919 or something like that, you could have your best operators be the ones who picked up on 911.

Here we have 311. (It's a general city services number, but is also advertised as the non-emergency police number.) That said, the cops are pretty liberal about who you should call 911 for around here. I go to community policing meetings and they basically have an attitude of "when in doubt, call 911." Even stuff like noise complaints are supposed to go to 911 here. Cite on that one.

You should call 911 if the incident you are reporting is in progress and the on-site presence of a police officer is necessary to help resolve the matter (e.g., burglary in progress, incident involving injuries, quieting loud neighbors, etc.).

I was surprised to find that out, but there ya go.

[actualliberalnotoneofthose]

The original news story said the police canvassed the school parking lot and could not find his vehicle but his dad found him 6 hours later. Has that story changed? The thing that made no sense to me was how the police had a description of the vehicle and it was there but no one could find him (this is a school, with a limited area, not a huge university or large city).

[Darren Garrison]

Originally Posted by actualliberalnotoneofthose

The original news story said the police canvassed the school parking lot and could not find his vehicle but his dad found him 6 hours later. Has that story changed? The thing that made no sense to me was how the police had a description of the vehicle and it was there but no one could find him (this is a school, with a limited area, not a huge university or large city).

Read the article in post #11 or my description in post #17.