Posted on 07/05/2021 2:37:45 PM PDT by Libloather
A medical examiner in Michigan says an autopsy has determined that Columbus Blue Jackets goaltender Matiss Kivlenieks died of chest trauma from an errant fireworks mortar blast, and not a fall as authorities previously reported.
Police in Novi, Michigan, said the mortar-style firework tilted slightly and started to fire toward people nearby Sunday night. The 24-year-old Kivleniek was in a hot tub and tried to get clear with several other people, police Lieutenant Jason Meier said.
The fire department and EMTs got to the private home shortly after 10 p.m. and took him to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead, Meier said. The Oakland County Medical Examiner's office reported preliminary autopsy results Monday afternoon.
Prior to the autopsy, police said Kivlenieks was believed to have slipped and hit his head on concrete while running from a malfunctioning firework.
"At the moment, we're pretty certain this was a tragic accident," Meier said.
The Blue Jackets and Latvian Hockey Federation announced Kivlenieks' death, with the NHL club saying it resulted from an apparent head injury in a fall. The team's statement made no mention of fireworks.
(Excerpt) Read more at cbsnews.com ...
“...died of chest trauma..”
Which is it...head or chest trauma? If head then maybe somebody did too vigorous CPR and coroner is covering up for legal purposes?
Yep my X’s cousin was killed on the 4th when he and his friends taped a bunch of mortar shells together and housed them in some sort of plastic box prior to detonation. Shrapnel blew into his neck snd he bled out. Super dumb but a good kid of ~16 yrs. Unfortunately, the event is on video as one of his buddies filed it.
A girl I grew up with had her eyes shot out by a bottle rocket when we were on high school. She was/is super gorgeous. Amazing how well they did with her ‘glass’ eye.
Had ONE shot out. Not both.
We had a little ground-only fireworks disply for the kiddos last night, and it was windy, so one of the fountains blew over on its side and spit out its show along the ground. I imagine that is sort of what happened in this case, only with some major firepower.
Not sure, looks like the remainder of a totally mangled hand..........
Did that prose strike anyone as odd? When I read that, It sounded like someone aimed it at the hot tub as a prank.
Sure, it could have just shifted or something on its own.
Anyway, too bad about the guy. Sounded like he was just trying to have a good time.
From what I heard last night on the street, that *PHOOM* was the firework leaving the tube. Wait a few seconds for the real explosion which lit up the neighborhood. If something like that was involved, all bets are off. Major firepower.
I’ve been involved in stupid crap when I was younger, even involving things that blow up.
Until I was thirty, I didn’t think I was going to make it to thirty.
It’s amazing any of us guys make it to adulthood. Many don’t.
When I tell my wife about the dumb-ass, dangerous, stupid things I did as a kid, she can only shake her head.
And I always thought I was a run-of-the-mill kid. The guys I knew my age growing up as a military brat going from station to station seemed just like me.
When I wasn’t doing something idiotic and dangerous, one of the other guys I variously knew were.
I have just felt nearly every guy goes through stages like that.
Anyway, a tragedy here. Prayers for his family.
It sounded like WWIII around here last night. Walmart was selling tons of fireworks at our three local stores the past couple of weeks. The usual fireworks stores were also selling them. But, man, they must have shot off a couple or more thousand dollars worth of bombs up behind our area last night. Crap was going off from after dark to around 1:30 a.m. I could have sworn I saw the 82nd Airborne dropping in on an assault!!!! :-) LOL
Getting more and more big fireworks (amateur) every year around my part of the world...people want to live dangerously....consequence of boredom, and media violence conditioning, and ignorance.
Darwin Award winner of the week?
Sad. RIP.
Reminds me of splitting my thumb open with a Black Cat when I was a kid. Bandaged it myself to keep mom and dad from finding out.
My guess: “ Commotio cordis is a phenomenon in which a sudden blunt impact to the chest causes sudden death in the absence of cardiac damage. ”
Basically an impact during a certain short phase of the heart beat stops it or goes into a fatal rhythm.
Yeah, I need to watch it. I wasn’t saying it was the case that someone was screwing around...they way they worded that seemed odd to me and made me suspicious.
I had four memorable incidents with “exploding things” in my life.
When I was 10, living on the Navy base at Yokosuka, I was down near the IJN Mikasa getting ready to sneak off base (you could get through the fence there) and while waiting for no one to see me, and bunch of Japanese kids appeared on the other side of the fence, and soon we were lighting firecrackers and flinging them over the top at each other. I tried to “cook” a firecracker (not a big one, just one of the little ones) and let the fuse burn down before I threw it over. When I reared back to throw it, it went off in my hand right next to my right ear. It resulted in painful ringing and I couldn’t hear a thing out of it for a while. I have awful tinnitus now, and I always thought that firecracker contributed to it. (That or sitting eleven rows from the stage speakers at a Blue Oyster Cult concert some years later!)
Then, when I was fourteen living on a Navy Communications station just a few miles from Andrews AFB, they put on a 4th of July fireworks show, and the sailors working the detail set up the launch site about 50 yards from the picnic area (LOL) which meant dozens of us walked even closer, and we were probably 30 yards away on a shallow hill, looking at the stacked fireworks and the two fire trucks parked next to them. They had a sailor working the detail who everyone (including families and kids) knew this sailor was a chronic f*ck-up and brig rat type. He wasn’t an evil guy, he just could not keep out of trouble. Anyway, they had him preparing to light off the fireworks with a traffic flare. (LOL) As we all watched, we saw a sudden flurry of activity. People began running around in little circles and we saw sailors pulling fireworks off the stack and tossing them, when EVERYBODY began running away, the sailors, the firemen, and the spectators! The whole thing went up all at once and completely destroyed one of the fire engines parked next to it. It was charred and black, and had holes in it. My dad later told me the sailor with the traffic flare had lit the flare with that little piece of emory cloth, which he caught on fire and he tossed it on the ground. The grass caught fire followed by the stack of fireworks, IIRC. It was spectacular once I stopped running! I have to laugh thinking of it-nobody would EVER do it like that today...
Back in the Eighties, we had a friend who worked for the city, and he pulled a few strings to let us drive our car up to the top of a hill where they were launching the fireworks, so we would get a bird’s eye view. I remember there ended up being five or six carloads of us up there, and they were launching the fireworks close by, and our view of them going off was grand. One of them (a starburst, I recall) took off, but instead of going “SHHH HHH HHHH HHHH H H HHH HH HHH HHH HHH HHH H HHH BOOOOOM!” It went “SHHHH HH HH BOOOM!” These things that looked like huge flaming coffee cans were hitting the asphalt all around us bouncing, trailing flames and exploding! I watched transfixed for a second or two, then came to my senses and dove under a parked car...everyone else was doing the same! Heh, nobody got hurt, but someone who was higher up the chain than my friend came over and kicked everyone off the hill! We didn’t argue...:)
Then, when I was in my late twenties, I went car-camping with a bunch of people, and there is a lot of drinking and fire involved. We were all having a good time in mid-afternoon, consuming lots of adult beverages, and my buddy went into the big tent to take a catnap. Then there was an explosion from the fire pit. One of the guys had put an unopened jar of some kind on fire grate, and when it cooked off, glass went everywhere, leaving holes in the tarp and just missing the big tent (and the rest of us) My buddy came storming out of the tent madder than a hornet, while the guy who put the jar there laughed. Well, he was one of those people you couldn’t stay angry with for very long, but I am sure glad nobody was hit by glass shrapnel.
I know a lot of good guys who were lucky they didn’t get that award. There but for the grace of God go I.
Heck. That too.
A friend had a crimson red picture on his computer one time when I went over to his place. I asked what it was. Apparently it was what was left after a guy set off an M-80 in his mouth. My friend started pointing out teeth on the outer edge of the photo. I’m not particularly squeamish, but that was tough to look at.
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