A bus carrying a Canadian junior hockey team crashed into a tractor trailer and so far at least 14 people are dead. Bitch of a way to do a line change.
It’s pretty much as horrifying as it gets. Remember they are kids, most probably still living with their parents.
And there's another 14 injured, some of them seriously. For every person that dies, you have their parents siblings, aunts and uncles, extended family, friends. Dozens if not hundreds of people that are affected for each person who was involved in that crash.
Just imagine the hockey league and how they have to handle this... "Soo.... uhmmm.... you guys were heading off to start a best of seven series.... and.... uhh... don't take this the wrong way, but, uh... we're going to have to mark you down as forfeiting..."
It's also a small community... the kind of place where hockey is THE thing to do in the winter... this will have a devastating impact to the region.
Hockey is like religion in that province. Saskatchewan has the most rabid fans of the sport in this country if you ask me. It’s just so remarkably sad in every way.
Remember that recent tourist helicopter flight in NYC that landed in the East River and killed everyone but the pilot? WIRED has a really smart, and informative article about it. Written by someone who was on a flight by the same helicopter tourism company, at the same time, and was interviewed by the NTSB following the crash.
My buddy, who works in the oil fields here in the Gulf of Mexico has to go through this training every couple of years. He's a Capt. on one of the dive tender boats so he's almost never on a chopper. The divers are the ones flown back and forth.
This is exactly what I feared when I first heard of the accident. Tourists very much untrained on how to free themselves in a crisis situation. It's shocking that they wouldn't at least have practice drills before takeoff. What's a few minutes more?
It's not that so much as the actual harness they were using... it was a "proprietary" harness (which is never a good thing when it comes to safety systems)... they'd have to reach around behind their back and undo a carabiner to unhook themselves from the aircraft. This harness allowed them to hang out the doors (which were taken off of the helicopter) to take pictures, etc, without fear of the quick-release coming loose on them. Their only real choice was to cut the harness off with a knife that was supposed to be near them. Good fucking luck.
The only semi-good news in all of this is that the FAA stepped in and have instituted major changes to equipment, policies, and procedures in a short few days, not weeks. The FAA just does not fuck around, and that is somewhat refreshing in this political bullshit day and age.
Wonder what would have happened if that other pontoon had properly inflated (or had time to inflate, they aren't sure which). Hell it might have prevented it. It's kinda the catch-22 in it all. You need disasters to make needed changes.
Next time you ask why not outlaw knives since people can be stabbed in response to gun control, remember this. You all caused it.
That’s exactly why I’m sneaking in a gun next time I go there. With me being the only armed human, I will become the Master.
I disagree. This just lays bare why the NRA won't give an inch. This is a future look at the incrementalist approach Democrats are trying to take on guns in America. Looking at violent crime in Europe, it shows that no measure of control, however large, will keep you safer than planning to protect yourself.
Wut? How so? England has had strict gun control laws forever, no real opposition to it either. Yet somehow, like gun rights activist have said all along, criminals find ways to criminal and the nanny state of England will have to think up new ways to restrict anything which ultimately doesn't solve the underlying issue. ODENs right about the incrementalism.