Posted on 07/17/2017 2:01:31 PM PDT by Responsibility2nd
(Newser) – The last message sent by 14-year-old Madison Coe before she was electrocuted in the bathtub shows the tragic mistake that killed her. "When you use and (sic) extension cord so you can plug your phone in while you're in the bath," the teen from Lovington, NM, wrote to a friend, sending a picture of the cord connection on top of a towel. But despite the precautions, Madison was apparently unaware that there was fraying on part of the cord, NBC 12 reports. Officials say she was killed after touching a frayed section while she was in the water. Investigators believe her phone was never immersed in the water.
According the US Consumer Product Safety Commission and the Lovington Police Department, the cord had been plugged into a non-grounded outlet with no circuit-interrupting safety mechanism, the New York Daily News reports. Family members released her final message to help raise awareness of the danger. Her father, firefighter and EMT Logan Coe, tells Inside Edition that Madison often took her phone into the bathroom to listen to music while she was in the tub. "Whenever I talked to Madison about it, she said, 'Dad, it's outside the tub,'" he says. A GoFundMe campaign to help the family has now raised more than $20,000.
I have a theory that, since we live in such a ‘safe’ world - kids bike helmets, ladders festooned with warnings, etc, that some kids can’t figure out what is REALLY dangerous...like 120v in the tub. Its kind of like ‘security theater’, but instead is ‘safety theater’, where minor safety issues and even safety myths (ie cell phones at gas pump) are given the same gravity as genuine dangers.
“the cord had been plugged into a non-grounded outlet with no circuit-interrupting safety mechanism”
first thing i did when i bought an older home was install GFIs for bathrooms, kitchens and outdoor receptacles.
“first thing i did when i bought an older home was install GFIs for bathrooms, kitchens and outdoor receptacles.”
to clarify, i installed GFI breakers in the breaker box for those circuits, not the individual receptacles.
It was a tragic, but the girl was literally begging to be electrocuted. Bathroom outlets are GFI-protected. She probably chose to use an outlet from another room that was not GFI. Even that shouldn’t be a problem as phone chargers output low voltage.But she compounded the mistake by using a frayed extension cord. This is at least the second case where a teanager did the impossible to sabotage safety measures in bathroom to be electrocuted.
> His daughter’s death could have been prevented by a $15 piece of equipment he could have bought at any hardware store. [Campion]
Not necessarily!
> This must have been an older home built before the current code. [Governor Dinwiddie]
Yes, many older homes don’t have a ground wire inside the wall itself (mine, built in the early 50s doesn’t). There’s no ground wire to connect the outlet to. (Catnipman, I assume you were able to connect all the needed lines. If there’s no ground wire running to the outlets themselves, GFI protection is an illusion.)
In two rooms I added a ground wire myself and ran it a short distance to an outdoor faucet metal pipe (there must be a good ground, and attached well. Ideally an electrician would make the connection.) I did that not for personal safety but to allow surge protectors to work properly.
Ordinarily a dry body won’t conduct 120 volts of electricity very well. I used to repair old radios and televisions, and through carelessness was shocked several times by 120v and considerably more. Any kind of moisture, though, and you’re in real danger. Even when just sweaty, I’m extremely careful.
> Bathroom outlets are GFI-protected.
Not necessarily in older homes (and rewiring a whole house is a major expense). See my previous post.
*shocking*
nice
“(Catnipman, I assume you were able to connect all the needed lines. If there’s no ground wire running to the outlets themselves, GFI protection is an illusion.)”
you assume correctly. the home was built in the 60’s, so all wiring was modern Romex with ground. Just no GFI breakers, which of course were a breeze to install.
The GFI works by sensing the return current. If the current into the cirucit doesn't match the current leaving the circuit, then it trips. It trips on unbalanced current. Someone using their body as a potentially lethal short to ground will disrupt the return current, thus tripping the GFI.
That's really one of the beauties of a GFI—that it can protect old wiring. But I agree that a three wire hot/neutral/ground wiring is beneficial too, but not having such wiring doesn't matter to the GFI.
I guess I’m old, but it seems to me that back in the 1950s-1960s, kids knew about this stuff by the age of 8 or 9, if not earlier. (I got my first electric shock at about 5, by sticking my hand into a lamp socket. There’s never been a second ;-)
> Actually, a GFI will protect users of a two-wire ungrounded circuit.
Wow! Thanks for that information! I thought I was doing a good deed to some of the others by passing on information about grounds, and instead received some in return.
Though I once knew enough about radios and tvs to repair them (and for a while repaired the old 8-bit computer motherboads professionally), I have no training as an electrician, and have never bothered to read up on GFIs (or GFCIs). I just assumed they needed a ground wire.
I’ve now checked, though, and confirmed with many sources that they’ll work in the old two-wire houses. I’ll put some in my house. Thanks again.
> Bathroom outlets are GFI-protected.
I suppose what I said previously about not necessarily in older homes still applies, but not the part about needing ground wires (as Governor Dinwiddie has informed me).
Yeah, sticking a butter knife into a wall outlet gave me the same results that you experienced. A case can be made that kids should have a “jolted” education like that - under supervision, of course.
I did lose a 3 year old nephew due to electrocution.
I don’t think she was lying. The phone and cord probably were outside the tub. They don’t think the phone was ever in the water - they think she was electrocuted when she touched the frayed cord. Heck - she could have even been standing on the floor with wet feet and damp hands in the humid bathroom and just unplugging her phone from the extension cord and could have gotten zapped. (Hmm- or the frayed part of the cord was resting on the humid tile floor - she gets out of the tub - puts her wet foot on the tile - bang.)
I wonder if that might have happened - she has the connection on a towel - I would assume to keep the connection off the damp tile. So it seems she may have thought she was being careful.
I recall back in high school our physic’s teacher talking about not touching the light or fan switch after getting out of the shower due to the rare chance of enough dust and humidity to allow the electricity to travel up the light switch to your finger.
Hmm - last week when it was hot I had a fan in the hallway. Hooked up to a similar style extension cord - plugged into the hallway bathroom outlet. Some of it sitting on the linoleum floor.......
I won’t be doing that again - and will warn the rest of the family not to do it either.
I’m sorry about your nephew.
I just remember that my Father taught us this stuff - and we were taught early. That isn’t going to stop a very willful child from trying something risky; but if respect for the teacher and the lessons are instilled early, a lot of later ‘bad stuff’ is avoided for most.
“School” isn’t going to teach these things.
I believe the Govn’r is correct. The GCFI simply compares the outbound current to the return current. If they differ by more than a few milliamps, it cuts the circuit. The ground wire is nice to enable even those few milliamps to be shorted harmlessly to ground, but not strictly necessary.
When you install your GCFI outlets, remember that they will generally protect ALL the outlets “downstream” from them on a circuit. So, pick the outlet that’s risky (e.g., by the bathroom sink), then trace that circuit back to the fuse box, and find the outlet on that circuit that’s closest to the fuse box — that’s where you install the GCFI. That way you protect every outlet on the circuit for the cost of only one GCFI.
> The GCFI simply compares the outbound current to the return current.
Yes, thanks, I’m convinced about that now.
I believe I need the ground for the outlets at which I have my surge protectors, though. If I’m wrong about needing it for surge protectors, somebody please let me know. Too late to save the work I did adding it, though. :-)
> When you install your GCFI outlets, remember that they will generally protect ALL the outlets “downstream” from them on a circuit.
I’ll probably install GCFI outlets at the places where I have concern. I rather like the idea of being able to press the Test button at the outlets that are most dangerous, and seeing that everything is working right.
After putting GCFIs at the couple of places I’m concerned about, though, I may take your suggestion and put them at places that will protect the whole house — just in case someone floods the living room, dining room, or bedroom, and then touches a live line (though that person’s luck has probably run out, anyway, and will probably be hit by a bus soon).
I don’t imagine having GCFIs in series would cause a problem. If it’s just a matter of an extra $15 or $30 — I have a small house — I might as well do so.
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