On the evening of October 29, a serious stampede occurred in Itaewon, Seoul, South Korea, with more than 150 people killed, including 4 Chinese.
What are the characteristics of fatal injuries in stampede accidents?
We can take the stampede accident at the Spring Lantern Exhibition in Mihong Park, Beijing in 2004 as an example.
On the evening of February 5, 2004, Beijing Mihong Park held a large-scale light exhibition park event, with a high flow of people, and a bridge about 3m wide was even more crowded. During this period, a tourist accidentally fell, which immediately caused the tourists behind him to stand unsteadily and fall one after another, which continued to cause large-scale crowding and stampede accidents, which eventually caused 37 deaths and 15 injuries.
After the forensic analysis found that among the
37 deceased, 28 females and 9 males. Women and children with medium-sized lower height are vulnerable groups and are the most vulnerable to injury.
The characteristic damage of the squeeze and trampling accident is:
1. The conjunctiva of the eyelids is densely slight bleeding, the head, neck, chest is cyanotic, etc., and some bleeding occurs in the mouth, nose and external auditory canals, which should be caused by sudden increase in pressure in the jugular venous system, causing capillary rupture. is a typical sign of mechanical asphyxiation;
2. Striped contusions at the squamous ribs, iliac crest, and anterior superior iliac spine are caused by the action of the bone padding below the corresponding part when squeezed by greater pressure. As well as multiple fractures of the ribs, they are strong evidence that the chest and abdomen have been squeezed by strong external forces;
3. Striped contusions in the sacral lumbar strips are mainly formed by the squeezing of the middle waist pads (belts, floors, etc.) and soft tissues under the action of spinous process pads.
4. Bumping and injury to the distal end of the limbs.
Injury of Itaewon Incident Image
But it is worth noting that only one of the 37 dead had multiple rib fractures and one had a mandible fracture, indicating that in this type of mass accident, fractures were rare due to crowd crushing and trampling between the people.
The causes of stampede accidents are highly consistent. mostly occurs in local areas of public places where population is concentrated, the density of people is high, and it is easy to form a bottleneck for abortion.
Itaewon This time it was in an alley or a downhill section. The following figure
accidents often show a point-to-face effect, that is, one person or a small-scale accident occurs first, which will continue to cause large-scale accidents. The reason for the Itaewon time is said to be that several young people who were a little excited started to cheer and push.
A small-scale accident caused a commotion among the crowd. In order to escape from the scene as soon as possible, people often use random crowds and bumps to further increase the density of local crowds. Falling in dense crowds makes it difficult to have the opportunity to return to normal posture.
If you fail to take a reasonable posture to protect yourself, you will easily be trampled and injured, and it will easily cause others to fall to the ground, causing accumulation and squeeze of the human body. People in the lower level may be limited in breathing due to long-term squeeze, and in severe cases, casualties.
Prevention measures for stampede accidents
The key to prevent mass squeeze and trampling accidents is to effectively reduce the entrance density of the bottlenecks in public places . The suggestions are as follows:
1. Ensure the rationality of design and quality and safety of public places facilities;
2. Set up eye-catching warning signs in relevant places, set up evacuation passages, evacuation areas, and set up guides;
3. Set up diversion facilities in relevant places to slow down the pressure of bottlenecks;
4. Telling signs of accidents should be promptly guided and stabilized;
5. When an accident occurs, the best protective posture for those who fall down is to hold their heads and curl up to reduce the possibility of injury, and ensure the respiratory movement space as much as possible, as shown in the figure below.
6. Actively publicize knowledge on preventing and responding to mass accidents;
7. Establish a multi-department coordination and linkage mechanism to improve rapid response and handling of accidents.
References: Chinese Journal of Forensic Science "Forensic Analysis of the Injury and Stomach accident in "
