Results tagged “injury”

A tourist injured herself yesterday when she fell eight feet into an "amphibious assault vehicle" on display aboard the USS New York. The woman was visiting the newly commissioned warship — which is forged out of steel salvaged from the remains of the World Trade Center — when she tumbled into a smaller vessel like those "that carried soldiers before they stormed the beaches of Normandy during World War II," the Post reports. The victim was taken to Bellevue Hospital, where she is in stable condition. The naval ship will leave its dock at Pier 88 tomorrow and sail to Atlantic Fleet headquarters in Norfolk, Virginia, where it will begin active duty, according to the boat's website.

You know the NY Post was just waiting for a jaywalker to be struck by a vehicle so they could be all "told you so," after printing numerous anti-jaywalking editorials this week.

Who doesn't love a good heroic dog story? Word is that a concerned canine named Max saved an 89-year-old woman in Little Neck last Friday. The pup, who is a neighbor's dog, made a ruckus after finding Tina DiLuca face-first in her garden on a 90-degree-day. His barking caused Maria DiLuca, her daughter, to rush outside. She said, “We live next door to Max and we’re used to hearing him bark. But he didn’t sound right. I looked out the window and I saw my mother laying there. She’s lucky she fell in the dirt and not the concrete.” Currently the 89-year-old woman is recovering from four fractured ribs and a few abrasions in the hospital, and is expected to stay there for a few weeks. Hopefully Max is getting some extra treats and belly scratches at home.

Earlier this morning, around 8 a.m., a 30-year-old man was hit by a large tree limb in Central Park, near West Drive and 63rd Street. The branch hit the man's head— he was struck unconscious and had severe bleeding. My Upper West adds, "Paramedics and police promptly arrived to the scene, and after about 15 minutes, took him to a hospital, where he seemed to be in serious condition." On Sunday, strong thunderstorms downed numerous trees in the city. Update: The Parks Department tells WCBS 2 "the limb is from a Pin Oak Tree, approximately 4 inches in diameter." Update 2: The man is now in a coma (it's unclear if it was medically induced) at Cornell Medical Center. The Post says first responders found him "unconscious and in cardiac arrest," while WCBS 2 reports, "The scene was such a mess it took nearly two hours for crews to clean up the debris and blood from the pavement."

Whaddaya know, those oh-so-controversial cheap lawn chairs scattered through the Broadway pedestrian plazas are falling apart! WCBS was on the scene yesterday to report on the disintegrating seats, and confirmed that the plastic straps holding them together are frayed and snapping! Critics have been dissing the chairs, bought at Pintchik Hardware in Brooklyn, since they first appeared, for supposedly attracting the homeless, the lazy, and the European. And now the haters have new ammo, because these things are obviously a grave safety hazard. Floridian tourist Norma Frank saw a chair collapse under her husband Mitch yesterday, and pleaded with New Yorkers for help, "If anybody would like to chip in for a new pair of pants and possibly a new knee..." Mitch insists he wasn't "really" injured, but sometimes it takes a lawyer to show you where it hurts. The Times Square BID will be replacing the chairs with sturdier street furniture by the end of the month, so get over there now if you want in on the inevitable class action lawsuit.

When it's nature versus hipsters, nature usually wins. First it was the Brooklyn Kickballers being scared of the newly planted saplings in McCarren Park, and now this. The Daily News reports that 23-year-old Justin Calicchio was playing a game of dodgeball in Carroll Park yesterday when a tree branch came out of nowhere and pinned him to the ground. Yikes. He told the paper from his hospital bed that, "I blacked out. Everything is starting to become clear again. My girlfriend has been telling me about it and I'm starting to remember now." He is suffering from back injuries but was told he barely dodged more serious problems. A friend reported back saying the branch was too big and fell too fast that there was no escaping it. Calicchio has lived in Carroll Gardens his whole life, and says the tree has always been there, and "branches have fallen off before." Paging the Parks Department!

Following Natasha Richardson's death last night, the NYC medical examiner's office performed an autopsy and announced the actress died from an "epidural hematoma due to blunt impact to the head." The NY Times looks at how a seemingly innocent spill on a bunny hill could have killed the actress, who walked back to her room joking about her fall on Monday, and turned away an ambulance that was originally sent for her by ski patrollers. Sadly, the Times talks to a doctor who assumes "The most likely injuries would have been treatable had they been detected promptly." While funeral arrangements are being made at the Greenwich Village Funeral Home, Playbill reports that "marquees of the Broadway theatres will be dimmed [tonight] at 8 PM for one minute."

As previously mentioned, sad news of actress Natasha Richardson being injured during a skiing accident yesterday was reported this morning. Richardson, wife of Liam Neeson, was at a Montreal-area resort taking a beginner's lesson when she fell. While she didn't have a helmet on, the NY Times has word from a spokeswoman at the resort who said “She didn’t show any signs of injury, she was talking and she seemed all right.” But now the 45-year-old Tony-award winner is reportedly in critical condition with a brain injury. The latest word is that she is "sedated and suffering from brain swelling -- but is not brain dead." And TMZ has just reported that she was boarded onto a private jet with a medic team to be taken to a new hospital that they believe is in New York City.

It's barely March, but it's fair to say that Alex Rodriguez is not having the best year ever. After reports surfaced yesterday that an MRI showed that tightness he was experiencing in his hip stemmed from a cyst, now word is that the cyst will require surgery that will keep A-Rod out for ten weeks. ESPN learned of this from his brother who told them that surgery to remove the cyst is scheduled for Monday in Colorado. Joe Rodriguez said, "It's a big blow for the whole family. Alex is destroyed. But the most important thing is to have a successful surgery so that Alex may continue his career." The procedure obviously means that A-Rod is out for the World Baseball Classic as well as more than a month of the Yankees inaugural year in their new ballpark. And to add insult to injury, just today the Daily News ran a feature of A-Rod's 10 biggest foot in his mouth quotes—our favorite being his allusion to nightly slumber parties with Derek Jeter.

In defending the city against a lawsuit brought by the family of a San Francisco musician who died after riding the Cyclone last year, a city attorney is insisting that the roller coaster's potentially fatal dangers are "obvious." While riding the Cyclone on his birthday in July 2007, 53-year-old Keith Shirasawa fractured three neck vertebrae and died four days later after complications from surgery. In the lawsuit, his family contends that the Parks Department is at fault for not regularly inspecting the landmark ride. But city attorney Cynthia Goldman argues that "any and all risks, hazards, defects and dangers to the extent alleged are of an open, obvious, apparent and inherent nature known and should have been known to [Shirasawa]," according to court papers obtained by the Daily News. Shirasawa family attorneys blame the injury on a malfunction that made the Cyclone drop too fast, and an "antiquated" single position lap bar.

On July 31st, 2007, 53-year-old Keith Shirasawa celebrated his birthday by riding the Coney Island Cyclone. Five days later he was dead. The San Fransisco musician fractured three neck vertebrae during the Cyclone's first 85-foot drop and later died after complications from surgery. His family has now filed a lawsuit against the city, arguing that the Parks Department is at fault for not inspecting the Landmark ride regularly. (The Parks Department contracts a private company to inspect and repair the ride; the contractor is also named as a defendant.) Lawyers for the Cyclone say the accident was caused by a malfunction that made the Cyclone drop too fast, and that's been fixed. In 2007 at least seven people were injured on the 81-year-old wooden roller coaster.

Yesterday around noon, an alert came through the newswire mentioning an "unusual rescue" at 145th Street involving a woman "pinned between two exercise machines at the gym."

Last Friday, Rev. Timothy Wright, the pastor of the Grace Tabernacle Christian Center in Crown Heights, was critically injured in a car crash in Pennsylvania that fatally injured his wife and 14-year-old grandson.

An amusement park ride inspector warns that some of the rides at Coney Island are so dangerous they should not be open for business. Last summer a man died after surgery to heal vertebrae fractured on the Cyclone, but the rides now targeted by “amusement-safety consultant” Walt Reiss don’t include the famous wooden roller coaster.

Last summer was a rough one for some riders of the 81-year-old Coney Island Cyclone; the Post reports that at least seven people were injured throughout the season while riding the roller coaster. According to Astroland operator Carole Albert’s website, the ride “has the highest safety standards in the outdoor amusement industry,” and in order to maintain that perception, Albert’s been trying to quietly settle the ensuing lawsuits out of court.

Two years ago, a jury decided that Starbucks should pay $301,000 to a customer whose feet were scalded with a hot coffee at a Midtown location. However, an Appellate Court reduced the verdict to $75,000--and Alice Griffin and her lawyer are still steaming about Starbucks' behavior.

A 7-year-old New York City boy has joined a growing number of children who’ve had the horrifying experience of getting their feet mangled by escalators while wearing popular plastic clogs made by Crocs. The boy’s mother says the accident happened in a Kentucky airport:

”All of a sudden I hear this excruciating screaming from Nicky and I turn around and his little foot is being sucked into the side of the escalator. It's just like chewing up his foot.”

Continue reading "More Crocs Escalator Nightmares!"

This week's story about a 500-pound retired NYPD cop trying to get more dough (the green money kind) inspired The Late Show with David Letterman's Thursday night top ten list.

When retired cop Paul Soto joined the force in 1993, he weighed a svelte 250 pounds. He now weighs over 500 pounds and is living off disability payments since maladies like narcolepsy, hypertension and, yes, morbid obesity, made his desk job unbearable. In 2006, he left the force, living off benefits which equal half his old paycheck, tax-free.