04/25/24
November 05, 2010
Videographer's Death Continues to Rock Notre Dame: Notre Dame athletics director Jack Swarbrick and coach Brian Kelly are facing calls to resign in the wake of team videographer Declan Sullivan's death last week in a scissor-lift collapse. "The fact that Declan died in this tragic accident means we didn't do all we can," Swarbrick told Christine Brennan of USA Today. "We'll think about that the rest of our lives." A day before Sullivan's death, Ohio State coach Jim Tressel faced the same storm system and gave this quote after sending his team to practice indoors: "It looks a little nasty. I worry about our cameramen, their well-being up there 50 feet in the air." A person who worked the same job for another university's football team has shared his thoughts on Deadspin: "I can assure you that the attitude of football programs nationwide when it comes to this equipment is not safety first."
Why did they even need to send the young man up in the lift? My son's high school team shot high angle video during their practices, and never sent anyone aloft. Rather, they used a boom truck, attached a high resolution digital video camera to it, wired the record/stop record switch and the record indicator through a long cable to allow control from the ground, and took a wide angle view. To look at the results and focus only on part of the picture, they had merely to pan and zoom digitally. They also used the same system to record games, with the restriction that they had to lower the boom to below the crossbar height during field goal and point after attempts. The truck itself was parked far enough back from the back of the end zone so as not to produce a hazard. While my son was out with a knee injury, he and another injured player operated the whole thing. It was quite simple.
I guess Notre Dame doesn't have much of a college of engineering if they never thought of this.
posted by Howard_T at 05:46 PM on November 05, 2010
I guess Notre Dame doesn't have much of a college of engineering if they never thought of this.
That's a bit of a cheap shot. As the Deadspin author notes: "What happened to him could have happened to any one of the many people across the country working that job." It's a classic case of a culture of "well, nobody ever got hurt doing it" until someone gets hurt -- and killed -- doing it, at which point everyone tries not to look each other in the eye in case they focus on the swaths of complacency and embedded shittiness that infect college athletics.
posted by etagloh at 10:35 PM on November 05, 2010
This tragedy only reinforces the fact that the Notre Dame football program is, and has been, like a ship drifting aimlessly for years now, living on past glory. I doubt anyone involved with the program is capable of making a decent decision.
The university had a good run as a football powerhouse, but put it to rest. All the boosters and alumni in the world can't change the fact the program has no leadership and little talent. The inability to even consider the safety of a person they employ going up in the air during high winds may, unfortunately, be the event necessary to end the embarrassment.
posted by dyams at 09:43 AM on November 06, 2010
Wow, no idea someone getting killed due to high winds and lack of oversight was a synchedoche for an entire college athletic program.
posted by yerfatma at 11:49 AM on November 06, 2010
The Notre Dame president has sent an email to students, faculty, staff and alumni taking full responsibility for Sullivan's death.
Although this story is about Notre Dame because it happened there, it sounds like these scissor lifts have been a tragedy waiting to happen for a while at a large number of schools. It seems silly to draw a larger point about Notre Dame malaise, but that's never stopped anybody before.
As Etagloh said, I think it's complacency. If something has never gone wrong, it never will.
I try to teach my kids that if their gut tells them something is unsafe, trust their gut. They're already neurotic, so this is an easy lesson.
posted by rcade at 11:55 AM on November 06, 2010
Wow, no idea someone getting killed due to high winds and lack of oversight was a synchedoche for an entire college athletic program.
Of course not, because it's Notre Dame. It's appalling for people to ever think this program is in shambles, but it was this way even before this tragedy. Keep on thinking the Irish offer anything but stories from long ago, because practically everyone does the same thing. Their program is a mere shell of what it once was, with failing coach after failing coach marching in and out. This incident is, in my mind, one more sad example of a dying, if not dead, program.
posted by dyams at 04:49 PM on November 06, 2010
It's a classic case of a culture of "well, nobody ever got hurt doing it" until someone gets hurt -- and killed -- doing it, at which point everyone tries not to look each other in the eye in case they focus on the swaths of complacency and embedded shittiness that infect college athletics.
Except we have an example of a team that didn't put their team and videographer in this position because they practiced inside. No one knows whether this could happen anywhere because we don't know what the practices of schools are when there are storms. We do know that student was certainly concerned about his own well-being. And, at least one other coach was concerned about the dangers of a student in that position.
posted by bperk at 07:34 PM on November 06, 2010
That's a bit of a cheap shot. As the Deadspin author notes: "What happened to him could have happened to any one of the many people across the country working that job." It's a classic case of a culture of "well, nobody ever got hurt doing it" until someone gets hurt -- and killed -- doing it
The point is that people get killed doing this and similar jobs at height with alarming frequency. If you have a job to be done aloft, you try to minimize the risk, if not eliminate it altogether. It's hardly a cheap shot to call into question an employer, any employer, that would not constantly review job safety procedures, and try to find better ways to do things. The example I used came about because those who were in charge looked at what was proposed and forbid the use of a manned lift. That forced some people to actually think the problem through and come up with a safe and effective solution.
posted by Howard_T at 09:56 PM on November 06, 2010
Keep on thinking the Irish offer anything but stories from long ago
And yet no one takes their eyes off the Irish. Because they have a frightening tendency to come back. With a brick.
posted by yerfatma at 09:54 AM on November 07, 2010
I went to a Division 3 college with a very successful athletics program that allowed its student-athletes to drive vans back and forth from events. That is, until a major accident occurred involving one of those vans, which ended up costing the life of one of my classmates. The coach was in the van, and it turns out that less than half of the students in that van were wearing seatbelts. Does this mean the school's attitude was "not safety first"? I don't know. That is a harsh accusation. I feel that nobody thought that such a thing could happen.
I don't know anything about Brian Kelly, but I thought that comparing his decision to Tressel's is a seriously cheap shot at the man's character. And I say this having gone to college in Ohio and generally hating everything Notre Dame-related.
However, these are kids they are putting in these scissor-lifts, it really is crazy when you think about it. I feel like this is more than just asking for Brian Kelly's head on a plate. This could be about creating organizations where students can share their safety concerns with the administration without worrying that they will lose their job working close to such a prestigious football team. Does the NCAA have a position on this story? If everyone is using these scissor lifts, and they are totally unregulated, precariously perching students 50 feet in the air, are we seriously going to sit here and play "blame the coach"?