7 January 2017

Sad news from Summernats as death of 30yo man confirmed

| Jane Speechley
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ACT Policing and Summernats have each issued statements confirming a 30-year-old man who was involved in a single vehicle incident at the event on Thursday afternoon has died as a result of his injuries.

The incident took place on site at EPIC around 4pm on Thursday. Police are appealing for any witnesses to call them on 131 444.

It is understood that the man died after falling from the back of a ute during the cruise route. Summernats has now banned all attendees from riding in the back of utility vehicles.

ACT Policing said in a Facebook post:

“Sadly, a man has died following a single vehicle incident at Summernats.

The incident occurred yesterday at approximately 4.00pm within Exhibition Park. The 30-year-old man was taken to hospital and has today died as a result of injuries sustained at the scene.

Police are examining the circumstances surrounding the incident and urge any witnesses or anyone who may have footage or information to contact ACT Policing on 131 444 or Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000.

Please keep the family and friends involved in this incident in mind and carefully consider your comments before posting.

Summernats has issued a statement, also via Facebook, saying:

“Yesterday at approximately 4pm there was a single vehicle incident inside Exhibition Park.

An ACT Ambulance Service vehicle based on site responded to the incident as did ACT Police.

A 30 year old male was transported to Canberra hospital, and has this afternoon passed away in hospital.

The ACT Policing’s Collison Investigation and Reconstruction Team are currently examining the circumstances around the incident.

The Summernats team offer their deepest condolences to family and friends of those involved.”

Our condolences to those affected as well, we’ll share more news as it comes to hand.

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This is very sad. Yes. But lets get real here.
People do die. Accidents do happen.
This is (so I heard) the first accidental death in 30years at this event.
That’s a pretty good record.
Seems it will be a pretty sad situation if it means that safety regulations are tightened even further. This is a fun event. It’s not my style personally. But I still want those who do enjoy it to be able to have fun.
Can we just exercise a bit of balance here & accept that one of the realities of life is death – and sometimes it comes unexpectedly, and often it comes too early.

Jane Speechley said :

bronal said :

The ABC covered this story heavily last night, even appearing to query the future of the Summernats. This is a typical media over-reaction to what appears to have been a freak accident at an event with a previously perfect record.

The Summernats organisers have done all that they can do in banning riding on flat-bed utes. No doubt this ban will become permanent from now on.

I’ve been really grappling with this over the past few days. My background is in PR and event management, so I have full sympathy for the organisers. To have something like this happen at your event is your worst nightmare.

But I’ve really struggled to understand why the event wasn’t stopped. Not forever, but for this year.

When three people died at Dreamworld, the entire park was shut down for weeks and a full investigation conducted. A young man dies doing something that is entirely commonplace at the festival, and the show seemed to go on without missing a beat.

I’m sure there’s a lot behind the scenes that I don’t know – maybe his family gave their blessing for the event to continue as planned – but I would think hitting ‘pause’ to show respect and thoroughly investigate what happened would be the least that you’d do?

Happy to hear other points of view on this though.

Very different circumstances. At Dreamworld the victims were simply going on a ride and of course expected it to be safe. The Summernats death was a man breaking the rules himself. The former was a tragedy, the latter an unfortunate accident. I’m not surprised that Summernats wasn’t shut down. Perhaps next year, though, as well as banning riding in the backs of utes, the organisers won’t allow people to hang out the windows of the cars, clearly without wearing seatbelts.

wildturkeycanoe said :

Once the light rail project is complete, they can have the Supercruise event run all the way down Northbourne with the Urbos tram leading the procession at a nice safe speed. All the yahoos who can’t fit inside the cars can jump on the tram and hang out the windows.

And at the end of the procession will be a giant rainbow and everyone will live happily ever after.

Jane Speechley2:11 pm 09 Jan 17

bronal said :

The ABC covered this story heavily last night, even appearing to query the future of the Summernats. This is a typical media over-reaction to what appears to have been a freak accident at an event with a previously perfect record.

The Summernats organisers have done all that they can do in banning riding on flat-bed utes. No doubt this ban will become permanent from now on.

I’ve been really grappling with this over the past few days. My background is in PR and event management, so I have full sympathy for the organisers. To have something like this happen at your event is your worst nightmare.

But I’ve really struggled to understand why the event wasn’t stopped. Not forever, but for this year.

When three people died at Dreamworld, the entire park was shut down for weeks and a full investigation conducted. A young man dies doing something that is entirely commonplace at the festival, and the show seemed to go on without missing a beat.

I’m sure there’s a lot behind the scenes that I don’t know – maybe his family gave their blessing for the event to continue as planned – but I would think hitting ‘pause’ to show respect and thoroughly investigate what happened would be the least that you’d do?

Happy to hear other points of view on this though.

wildturkeycanoe6:51 am 09 Jan 17

Once the light rail project is complete, they can have the Supercruise event run all the way down Northbourne with the Urbos tram leading the procession at a nice safe speed. All the yahoos who can’t fit inside the cars can jump on the tram and hang out the windows.

bronal said :

The ABC covered this story heavily last night, even appearing to query the future of the Summernats. This is a typical media over-reaction to what appears to have been a freak accident at an event with a previously perfect record.

The Summernats organisers have done all that they can do in banning riding on flat-bed utes. No doubt this ban will become permanent from now on.

The media – especially the local media – seems to jump to conclusions whenever something happens at Summernats saying the event will be shut down or relocated to Sydney.

In 1992/93 the Supercruise happened on New Year’s Eve and several incidents happened including traffic lights and trees being uprooted and fence palings being used to start campfires along Northbourne Ave. The local media – especially radio – said that the AFP had banned the event and Chic Henry was moving it to Sydney.

The AFP was swamped with abusive phone calls and they were forced to issue a statement saying that they hadn’t banned Summernats and would be consulting with the ACT Government and the organisers about how they could keep the event in Canberra. One of the changes was moving the event forward a week to the present dates, thus avoiding a clash with New Year’s Eve.

So as far as Summernats is concerned, take everything you hear in the media with a large grain of salt. The local media in particular have never really warmed to Summernats because it is seen as a boy’s event and sexist, and like to stick the knife in when the going gets tough.

The ABC covered this story heavily last night, even appearing to query the future of the Summernats. This is a typical media over-reaction to what appears to have been a freak accident at an event with a previously perfect record.

The Summernats organisers have done all that they can do in banning riding on flat-bed utes. No doubt this ban will become permanent from now on.

bryansworld said :

Silentforce said :

Sorry to hear this. My condolences to the Family and Friends of Mr Newsome.

This incident is so reminiscent of what happened to David Boyd and Robert Wise in the same period in similar circumstances on the Federal Highway Boxing Day 1986. No doubt some Summernats organisers, ACT Police/AFP members and Summernats participants will remember this tragedy. It is a shame that no lessons were learned by those mentioned or by our legislators. http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/130637316?searchTerm=David%20Boyd%20Wise&searchLimits=l-state=ACT|||sortby=dateDesc

I’m pretty sure riding in the back of a ute is illegal?

On a public road yes.

bryansworld said :

Silentforce said :

Sorry to hear this. My condolences to the Family and Friends of Mr Newsome.

This incident is so reminiscent of what happened to David Boyd and Robert Wise in the same period in similar circumstances on the Federal Highway Boxing Day 1986. No doubt some Summernats organisers, ACT Police/AFP members and Summernats participants will remember this tragedy. It is a shame that no lessons were learned by those mentioned or by our legislators. http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/130637316?searchTerm=David%20Boyd%20Wise&searchLimits=l-state=ACT|||sortby=dateDesc

I’m pretty sure riding in the back of a ute is illegal?

Apparently not in the Middle East.

Silentforce said :

Sorry to hear this. My condolences to the Family and Friends of Mr Newsome.

This incident is so reminiscent of what happened to David Boyd and Robert Wise in the same period in similar circumstances on the Federal Highway Boxing Day 1986. No doubt some Summernats organisers, ACT Police/AFP members and Summernats participants will remember this tragedy. It is a shame that no lessons were learned by those mentioned or by our legislators. http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/130637316?searchTerm=David%20Boyd%20Wise&searchLimits=l-state=ACT|||sortby=dateDesc

I may have missed something but I can’t see any similarities in the two accidents.

The current accident involved one utility at a controlled event with the victim falling off the tray.

The 1986 incident involved two vehicle collision on the open road one of which was a utility with 3 men in it. Two of them sadly died. All appeared to be in the cab.

Silentforce said :

Sorry to hear this. My condolences to the Family and Friends of Mr Newsome.

This incident is so reminiscent of what happened to David Boyd and Robert Wise in the same period in similar circumstances on the Federal Highway Boxing Day 1986. No doubt some Summernats organisers, ACT Police/AFP members and Summernats participants will remember this tragedy. It is a shame that no lessons were learned by those mentioned or by our legislators. http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/130637316?searchTerm=David%20Boyd%20Wise&searchLimits=l-state=ACT|||sortby=dateDesc

I’m pretty sure riding in the back of a ute is illegal?

Sorry to hear this. My condolences to the Family and Friends of Mr Newsome.

This incident is so reminiscent of what happened to David Boyd and Robert Wise in the same period in similar circumstances on the Federal Highway Boxing Day 1986. No doubt some Summernats organisers, ACT Police/AFP members and Summernats participants will remember this tragedy. It is a shame that no lessons were learned by those mentioned or by our legislators. http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/130637316?searchTerm=David%20Boyd%20Wise&searchLimits=l-state=ACT|||sortby=dateDesc

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