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Calgary Girl Killed By Toppled TV

Little Girl Killed By Toppled TV
Ryan Klos via Getty Images

A six-year-old Calgary girl is dead after a television toppled over and fell on her.

According to the Calgary Herald, crews were called to a Southwood home around 7 p.m. Wednesday evening after an older tube TV fell on the girl.

Global News reports the girl was rushed to the Rockyview Hospital by ambulance, but succumbed to her injuries shortly after.

“It really was a freak accident,” EMS spokesperson Chelsea Small told Metro News.

“It just seemed like something that randomly happened.”

Gary Smith, president of the Child Injury Prevention Alliance in Columbus, Ohio, told the Herald every 30 minutes in the U.S. a child is taken to hospital for a television-related injury, many of those related to televisions that fall over.

A 2013 study published in the journal Pediatrics says 200,000 children in the U.S. have been injured by falling TV sets between 1990 and 2011.

"For our EMS crews, sometimes these types of calls are career enders,” Small told Global.

"These types of calls with kids never leave us, they stay with us always.”

Health Canada recommends the following precautions:

  • Always supervise children in the home and teach them not to climb or hang from furniture.
  • Choose storage furniture, such as bookcases, cabinets, television stands and dressers, with a wide and stable base that sits directly on the floor. Models with legs or wheels are more likely to tip over.
  • Attach furniture to the wall using angle braces, anchors or safety straps. Secure to a stud if possible.
  • Place televisions far back on low stable furniture that is designed to hold the weight and size of the television. Attach the television to the stand if possible.
  • Do not place items that may appeal to a child, such as toys, plants and remote controls, on top of a television or tall furniture.
  • Keep electric cords behind furniture where children cannot reach them.

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