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Topic: Reclining seat death

Alan Plester
Expert Film Handler

Posts: 209
From: great yarmouth england
Registered: Apr 2001

posted 03-22-2018 03:34 AM

Has anyone read/heard about the tragic consequence to the 24yr old who lost his life whilst trying to remove his mobile from under a recliner in a VUE cinema in England? Of course there is now boatloads of comments that these chairs have no place in cinemas,& should all be removed,
Has anyone had an experience with one of these chairs before, & just how long have they been in theaters, without a problem.

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Sam Graham
AKA: "The Evil Sam Graham". Wackiness ensues.

Posts: 1431
From: Waukee, IA
Registered: Dec 2004

posted 03-22-2018 08:19 AM

Here's the story for reference...

Tributes paid to young dad who died after getting head trapped in cinema seat

Ateeq Rafiq suffered a cardiac arrest after an electronic footrest at the Vue Cinema in Star City, Birmingham, clamped down on his head on March 9.

The dad-of-one had been trying to retrieve his phone from under his VIP Gold Class seat when the accident happened. His distraught wife tried to help him along with staff at the cinema but he died a week later on March 16 at Heartland Hospital, despite paramedics managing to restart his heart following the accident.

A security guard who rushed to help Mr Rafiq said he was panicking and lost consciousness after a few minutes. ‘His poor wife was screaming his name as we tried to pull him back out. It was really horrible to witness,’ he said. A close friend of Mr Rafiq, who wanted to remain anonymous, paid tribute to him, adding: ‘Ateeq was only 24 years old. He was so young and had his whole life ahead of him. ‘His family have lost a son, a father, a brother and a husband. He left behind a lovely daughter who is only two years old.’ ‘He was a lovely, humble, down to earth guy who was always smiling. ‘He literally had everything to live for. ‘We are all devastated to have lost him so early and are in shock. We cannot believe it.’

Mr Rafiq’s sister-in-law Fatima Arzo said her family was struggling to cope with his untimely death. ‘We are grieving and completely in shock. My sister is in pieces,’ she said. ‘We are grateful to everyone who tried to help him, and at the moment we are praying and trying to come to terms with the fact we lost a loved one.’

A spokesman for Vue cinema confirmed Mr Rafiq’s death in a statement yesterday. ‘Following an incident which took place on Friday 9 March at our Birmingham cinema, we can confirm that a customer was taken to hospital that evening,’ he said. ‘We are saddened to learn that he passed away on Friday 16 March. ‘A full investigation into the nature of the incident is ongoing. ‘Our thoughts and condolences are with the family who have our full support and assistance.’

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Randy Stankey
Film God

Posts: 6539
From: Erie, Pennsylvania
Registered: Jun 99

posted 03-22-2018 11:40 AM

I have to agree that powered recliners are a glactically stupid idea in a dark theater, in close quarters with lots of people moving around.

There would need to be so many safety devices, failsafes, limit switches and force detectors on such a chair that it would be prohibitively expensive to put such a thing in a movie theater.

I wonder whether there was some kind of remote switch or automation cue that causes the seats to reset at the end of the movie?

IMO, this is going to spawn one of those proverbial, "we will own your house" kinds of lawsuits.

If it doesn't... I think it should! [Wink]

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Dennis Benjamin
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1445
From: Denton, MD
Registered: Feb 2002

posted 03-22-2018 01:15 PM

I am guessing these were powered recliners that go back to the upright position on thier own and/or by a central switch. If someone pushed a button to return it to the upright position, I am guessing they will be charged with involuntary manslaughter.

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Harold Hallikainen
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 906
From: Denver, CO, USA
Registered: Aug 2009

posted 03-22-2018 01:56 PM

Is a "return to unreclined" master switch common? If so, it seems like it should be in tbe auditorium so it can stopped if there is a problem.

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Mitchell Dvoskin
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1869
From: West Milford, NJ, USA
Registered: Jan 2001

posted 03-22-2018 02:54 PM

I suspect that there is no "master switch", but rather a sensor in the seat that returns the seat to upright position when it senses that nobody is sitting in it.

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Monte L Fullmer
Film God

Posts: 8367
From: Nampa, Idaho, USA
Registered: Nov 2004

posted 03-22-2018 05:02 PM

Might be a different story, but still follows the topic when you get motorized technology involved with human existence:

Heard that a self driven UBER vehicle with patrons in the cabin ran over a pedestrian, whom died later in the hospital.

UBER immediately discontinued this practice of self driven vehicles.

Monte

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Frank Cox
Film God

Posts: 2234
From: Melville Saskatchewan Canada
Registered: Apr 2011

posted 03-22-2018 05:41 PM

One interesting fact that seems to get lost in that story is that to this point self-driving cars have apparently driven more miles without any fatalities than regular cars manage to do.

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Marcel Birgelen
Film God

Posts: 3357
From: Maastricht, Limburg, Netherlands
Registered: Feb 2012

posted 03-22-2018 06:06 PM

What's the proper naming convention for recliners? Deaths per flip? Or deaths per reclined inch?

And does anybody keep statistics of those regarding autonomous manually ("elbow grease") controlled recliners, fully automatic autonomous electric recliners, semi-automatic electric recliners and hive-minded electric recliners?

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Mike Blakesley
Film God

Posts: 12767
From: Forsyth, Montana
Registered: Jun 99

posted 03-22-2018 06:08 PM

Yes, the pedestrian that was killed by the self-driving car stepped out in front of it, outside of a crosswalk, so it's completely possible the exact same thing would have happened if a person had been driving the car.

On the reclining seats....there is at least one company that offers a "return all seats to upright" control, and also a "recline all seats" control (to allow for sweeping underneath them) but I can't imagine said seats wouldn't have some kind of a device to shut down the motor in the event of a blockage.

Then again, I suppose the seats aren't designed with the notion that patrons will stick their heads underneath the footrests either.

Looks like the reclining seats just got a little more spendy.

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Martin McCaffery
Film God

Posts: 2481
From: Montgomery, AL
Registered: Jun 99

posted 03-22-2018 06:23 PM

quote: Frank Cox
One interesting fact that seems to get lost in that story is that to this point self-driving cars have apparently driven more miles without any fatalities than regular cars manage to do.

I guess it depends on your source.
Blogger

quote:

There are 12.5 deaths per billion vehicle miles driven (1). This is the statistic that self-driving cars have to beat in order to be "safer."

Based on this(2), Uber has had about 3 million test miles (under mostly safer than average road conditions, but I'll leave that aside). They're now at 333 deaths per billion miles driven. Gonna have to go a few more days without a death before they're "safer." (This is not all robot cars, of course, but not all robot cars are meaningfully the same right now).

1) Wiki Source
2)Behind a paywall at Forbes.com

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Frank Cox
Film God

Posts: 2234
From: Melville Saskatchewan Canada
Registered: Apr 2011

posted 03-22-2018 07:00 PM

Uber isn't the only outfit that makes/tests/drives autonomous cars, though. And none of the other makers (18 more other than Uber, apparently) have had any known fatalities either.

A fairer statistic would be to add up all of the miles driven by all of the makers and not just Uber alone. Plus one is a really hard number to use for this kind of thing -- had it happened during the very first mile driven their fatality rate would be 100%!

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Martin McCaffery
Film God

Posts: 2481
From: Montgomery, AL
Registered: Jun 99

posted 03-22-2018 07:59 PM

I'm not going to make any claim of knowing anything about this, but I doubt all of the robocars in the world have approached 1 billion miles yet. And given most of those miles are probably on test track conditions, even if they could get anywhere close to 12.5/billion the stats would still be unfairly skewed in their favor.

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Randy Stankey
Film God

Posts: 6539
From: Erie, Pennsylvania
Registered: Jun 99

posted 03-22-2018 08:09 PM

I am a big fan of computers, artificial intelligence and all that stuff. It's one of those things that really makes the circuits in my brain "light up" so to speak. [Smile]

However, the one place where I draw the line in the sand is that there MUST be a way for a human to take control and bring said machine(s) to a safe stop at any time it is necessary.

In the case of the "Chair of Death," there should have been a safety sensor or an emergency stop button to stop the mechanism when a person gets in the way of any moving parts.

Powered windows in cars have force sensors which stop and reverse the mechanism in case a person's head or arm gets in the way.

Why didn't that chair have such a thing?

Yes, I agree that the person who okayed the installation of those chairs without making sure that such safety mechanisms were in place and working should be charged with negligent manslaughter.

As I said above, this should be one of those "own your house" kind of accidents.

There are no excuses for this kind of crap! [Frown]

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Leo Enticknap
Film God

Posts: 7474
From: Loma Linda, CA
Registered: Jul 2000

posted 03-22-2018 09:50 PM

Agreed totally with Randy. That's why I don't like automatic transmissions and would always drive manual unless I had absolutely no practical choice in the matter. If you lose control of the engine for any reason, you always have the option of depressing the clutch and putting the transmission into neutral.

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