Page 13 - IAV Digital Magazine #604

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Woman Killed By Malfunctioning Ottoman Bed
By Issy Ronald, CNN
LondonCNN — A 39-year-old British woman was killed when a malfunctioning ottoman bed fell on her neck and asphyxiated her, a coroner’s report said.
Helen Davey, who lived in northeastern Engl and and ran a beauty salon,
died in June as she “was leaning over the storage area of an Ottoman-styled ‘gas-lift’
bed,” coroner Jer emy Chipperfield said in his report, released last week.
Ottoman beds have a base that can be raised – usually using gas- lift hydraulics – to access a storage space under-
neath. They are a popular choice for householders wanting to keep bedding or unseasonal clothes out of sight.
The mattress platform on Davey’s bed fell unexpectedly, “trapping her neck against the upper surface of the side panel of the bed’s base,” Chipperfield
explained. “Unable to free herself, she died of positional asphyxia. One of the two gas-lift pistons was defective.”
Davey was found by her daughter, Elizabeth, accord- ing to a statement read in court and reported by local paper The Northern Echo.
“I went upstairs,
my mam’s bed- room door was wide open, and I saw her lying on her back with her head under the bed,” Elizabeth said in court.
“Her legs were bent as if she was trying to get up. I dropped everything that I was holding and tried to lift the top of the bed off her head. The bed was no longer a soft close and could fall heavily if it was released. It was so heavy for me to lift it up and try to pull her out. I managed to lift it up enough to use my foot to support it.
“I noticed that her face was blue with a clear indent on her neck from the frame. I managed to pull her clear. I feared that she was dead as she made no sound. I started CPR and noticed that she wasn’t breathing,” she said.
Chipperfield warned in a letter to Britain’s busi-
ness secretary, Jonathan Reynolds, that there is a risk of future deaths “unless action is taken,” highlight- ing the “existence and use of gas piston bed mech- anisms whose failure presents risk to life,” as a “matter of con- cern.”
Under UK law, coroners must report to the rele- vant organization or government agency when they think action should be taken to prevent future deaths.
In the UK in 2022, 147 people died after falling from a bed and another 18 died by accidental suf- focation or stran- gulation in bed, the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents (RoSPA) told CNN, citing their analysis of the cause of mortality data collected by government agencies.
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