Avoid Dangerous Black Friday Shopping Injuries

Are you one of the tens of thousands that will be getting up early the Friday morning after Thanksgiving, known as Black Friday, and shopping for some of the best deals that are available?  Whether it is your first time shopping on Black Friday or if this is something you do every year you are probably familiar with the massive amount of people that go out shopping for low prices and discounted items on Black Friday.  You may also be aware that sometimes the Black Friday crowds can get out of hand and may be rude, start fights, push, shove or trample on yourself or someone else around you. 

This year the Occupational Safety & Health Administration (OSHA) has come up with new guidelines on how to prevent shopping injuries this Black Friday but more specifically how to prevent shopping related deaths among employees and other shoppers.  The OSHA designed these guidelines to be for employers to put into practice this Black Friday.  According to a OSHA the number of crowd related injuries on Black Friday have been steadily increasing every year and this year they would like to see stores but the new guidelines into practice to help prevent people from becoming injured on Black Friday. 

Hearing that the OSHA has issued a set of guidelines to be followed for Black Friday may seem like a bit much to some who have not heard of past shopping related injuries on past Black Friday's.  In 2007 a woman was injured in a Wal-Mart on Black Friday.  Cecelia Brannon was a victim of a shopping injury when she was trampled by the Black Friday crowd. Cecelia, in an attempt to get a laptop computer for her daughter, was pushed by a crowd of people attempting to purchase the same laptop for $100 off.  Once she was pushed onto the floor she was trampled on by the crowd.  Cecelia is now permanently disabled and walks with a cane.  The injuries she sustained from being trampled on by other customers at the store were a concussion, back, neck and memory problems. 

The next victim of crazed, dangerous Black Friday shoppers was a Walmart employee who was trampled to death in 2008 in Long Island, New York.  The incident happened when a group of anxious shoppers could not wait any longer to get into Walmart to go shopping which was scheduled to open at 5 a.m.  The crowd of Black Friday shoppers grew tired of waiting for the store to open and began breaking down the sliding glass doors at the Wal-Mart.  Six to ten Wal-Mart employees inside of the building tried to push back on the doors to keep the crowd from breaking in but they were unable to hold back the 2,000 shoppers waiting on the other side.  Jdimytai Damour, a seasonal Wal-Mart employee, was the door greeter that Black Friday and when the doors broke down and the crowd came pouring in he was knocked on the floor and trampled to death by shoppers.  During that same incident at least four other shoppers were injured by the crowd one of which was an eight month old pregnant woman.  The incident was considered to be "avoidable" and there were investigations against Wal-Mart to find out why the proper precautions against such a tragic event weren't prevented.  There was inadequate security at the building and there were no safety barriers put in place. 

Tragic events such as what occured at Wal-Mart on two seperate years happen every year on Black Friday but it is estimated that only 1 out of every 10 shopping injuries are reported. This year Wal-Mart has went as far as not closing their store on Thursday evening to prevent Black Friday injuries.  Wal-Mart will be opened from Thanksgiving morning until friday evening.  Aside from certain stores such as Wal-Mart taking their own steps to prevent injuries this Black Friday the OSHA is trying to make shopping safer.  Here are some guidelines that you may see being put into practice to keep shoppers safe:

• Trained security personnel or police officers at the store site
• Barricades or security ropes lines for crowd control
• Security and service personnel will explain plans and the correct proceedures for entering and shopping in the store
• Lotteries or drawings to decide who will get first access to "hot" sales items
• Limited number of shoppers will be allowed to enter the store one time

We hope that you have a safe Black Friday shopping experience and remember to be careful in the shopping crowds that will be out this friday.  In the event that you are injured while shopping you should contact a personal injury lawyer as soon as you receive medical attention.  Contacting an injury lawyer will not only help you get compensated for your store injury but will also help put extra measures into store policy for how to handle crowds and will hopefully prevent further incidents from happening.  Likewise, if you are an employee and are involved in a work related injury you should contact a workers compensation attorney regarding your injuries.  To contact a injury lawyer or workers compensation lawyer in New York click here to fill out our web form.