A 16-year-old bowling alley employee was pulled from a pin-sweeping bar that trapped the worker under its weight Sunday.
“Unable to escape from the sweeper bar’s weight and pressure (his/her) breathing became restricted resulting in a loss of consciousness,” the Windsor Locks Police Department posted on Facebook.
Authorities said the victim’s coworkers managed to raise the bar manually and free the teenager who “remained unresponsive with only a faint pulse and shallow breathing.”
The Spare Time bowling alley employee was was rushed to Hartford Hospital around 4:20 p.m. New Haven station WTNH referred to the juvenile victim as a female. Police in Connecticut said Monday that the unidentified workers was recovering after being treated overnight by medical professionals.
The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) is reportedly investigating Sunday’s incident.
OSHA workers have documented several cases involving bowling alley fatalities including two 2022 events when workers were killed by pin-setting equipment.
One of those deadly mishaps occurred in Corning, N.Y., when a 50-year-old man became trapped between a machine’s frame and main assembly “killing him by mechanical asphyxia.”
The other fatality that year involved a 37-year-old Texas man whose neck became trapped between a pair of bars, according to investigators.
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