81-year-old woman in wheelchair dies after falling from bus in Hokkaido
HOKKAIDO —
An 81-year-old woman in wheelchair died Monday after she fell from a wheelchair lift on a bus in Hidaka, Hokkaido. Shigeko Tamiya fell from a height of about 90 cm from the lift of a chartered bus around 12:25 p.m. in a car park while her caregiver, 53, and the bus driver, 53, who controlled the lift, were trying to get her onto the bus.
Tamiya hit her head and was taken to hospital where she died about one hour later. The caregiver also fell down and suffered a minor leg injury, police said.
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Hughgarse
details?? did the machine hoist malfunction? was it human error?
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serindipity
Condolences to the family, but it makes one wonder why helmets are not compulsory for ALL open wheeled machines. I saw an old fella have a stack on his electric quad-racer a fortnight ago and he sustained pretty serious head injuries. It' just too easy to die when you are old. It seems odd that there were two other people there, one of which was slightly injured, but neither of them were able to catch the granny. Could they have been negligent? Or was she a 150kg super gran?
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Sarge
"Tamiya hit her head"
That'll do it. My condolences. Seems as though the caregiver and/or the bus driver didn't know what they were doing with the wheelcair lift.
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melissamt
My heartfelt sympathy goes out to the family of Mrs. Tamiya.
But I must say I agree with Serindipity. Silly as it might be for an 81-year-old woman on a wheelchair to be wearing a helmet, it probably would have saved her had she been wearing one.
More likely than not, I believe you are right Sarge - if there was no malfunction in the lift then neither the bus driver or caregiver had any experience in getting this woman on board.
I would think again about who you trust your life with - especially at an old age.
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