16-year-old dies at football practice

[The Straight Story]

16-year-old dies at football practice
Posted: Saturday, May. 14, 2011

MORGANTON A 16-year-old Caldwell County youth died while doing calisthenics during a football practice at Freedom Park Thursday night.

A Burke County EMS spokeswoman told the Observer Friday that emergency workers responded to a call of heat exposure at the park at 6:11 p.m. and transported the victim to Grace Hospital in Morganton.

WBTV identified the boy as Luke Killian and reported that he played for the Morganton Mountaineers, a team affiliated with a league made up of home-schooled children.

http://www.charlotteobserver.com/2011/05/14/2295456/across-the-region-the-latest-from.html

[crim son]

1. So very sad.

And preventable.

[Zax2me]

2. This happens a lot, unfortunately.

Some students with heart conditions that are sometimes difficult to detect end up on the football team and die during training.
Heat exposure, no excuse.
The old school of drill them till they drop and deny them water died out over the last couple decades.

A good movie on ESPN featuring Bear Bryant - Junction Boys - showed these old school methods at their absolute worst.
http://espn.go.com/eoe/junctionboys
It covers Bryant's short tenure at Texas A&M before his Alabama head coach days.
He drove most of the kids from training camp and almost killed one.
This isn't tough football stuff. This was dumb stuff, like denying water after workouts in 100 degree heat.

[SheilaT]

3. Football practice? In May?

I thought football season began in late summer.

edited to correct the month.

[Keith Bee]

5. Even in late summer.....

...the players need to stay fully hydrated.

[JonLP24]

7. Agree

and I also add staying hydrated is important in the winter especially because of the cooler weather we don't notice how dehydrated we are as well as you would in the summer.

[JonLP24]

6. In my high school

Sign-ups were in the Spring and we practiced, watched tape, and lifted weights all through the summer.

Baseball was somewhat similar. In the fall baseball was technically an elective course but it was practice/tryouts. Baseball season was in the spring.

[pnwmom]

4. Heat exposure. This was avoidable. This is so infuriating! n/t

[NNN0LHI]

8. 18 year old kid I hired in with dropped dead after the first couple hours on the job

He had just passed a company physical that same day. EKG and everything.

Nurse came out to the plant floor and said he was dead before he hit the ground.

He came up from the south just to get a job at Fords. That is what he called Ford.

Tall lanky kid.

Sad stories like this do happen.

Don