Television Falls on 6-Year-Old Boy, Killing Him
A 6-year-old boy from Arlington Heights, Ill., a Chicago suburb, was reportedly killed when a heavy television set fell on top of him in the basement of his family home Sunday.
Karl Clermont was in the basement unattended while his aunt was upstairs with a 3-year-old girl who also lives in the home, reported The Daily Herald. When the woman heard a loud crash she rushed downstairs to find the boy under the television. She called 911, and then fetched a neighbor to help her move the heavy set. Clermont was taken to Northwest Community Hospital in Arlington Heights, but was pronounced dead around 9:45 p.m., the newspaper reports.
"[Clermont] may have climbed up to grab something that may have been on top of the TV and the TV just fell on top of him," police Capt. Kenneth Galinksi, Jr. Monday.
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Police also informed the press that the television was an approximately 36-inch, 18 inches tall older, tube model. It was resting on top of a TV stand.
Experts told the media that the boy's death spotlights dangers posed by heavy furniture, The Chicago Tribune reported Tuesday. They worry that accidents involving children being crushed by tipping objects happen way too often, as confirmed by a recent report by the Consumer Product Safety Commission.
"We view it as one of the most dangerous hidden hazards in the home," commission spokesman Scott Wolfson told the Tribune. "Sometimes a TV simply looks more stable than it is, and the desire to climb within a child creates a very serious risk."
Dr. Gary Smith, director of Ohio's Center for Injury Research and Policy, who co-wrote a 2009 study on the problem of television sets and furniture tipping over and injuring children, told the newspaper that this problem was not only common, but increasing.
According to his study, children 6-year-old and younger accounted for most of such injuries. TVs were the most common cause of such accidents with children 9-years-old and younger. The study also reportedly claims that many of the injuries could have been avoided had the TV and furniture been secured and the items that might interest children were not put high up.
