I am SOOOO Mad!

Originally posted by aquageek Being a Southerner I am familiar with the process of frying. You do realize that in order to fry potatos, they have to be much, much greater a temperature (350 range) than what McDs serves coffee at? So, we can now look for the hot fry suit soon. You can also make fried ice cream in 350 degree oil, with most of the ice cream still frozen. Geek, are you aware that the air in your oven could get as hot as 450 degrees? Madness, madness I tell you! But when you open your oven door (to look inside), you expect a wave of hot air. If there is steam inside, you might even expect to get a mild 1st degree burn. You would not expect 3rd degree burns. (On the other hand, a pressure cooker can give you 3rd degree burns, which is why there are a lot of safety precautions to make it difficult to open one by accident.) If you spill hot french fries in your lap, you can brush them off and likely not get burned. You spill your coffee on your arm at home (because the kids run by and hit your chair), you have time to take off your shirt and run cold water. Maybe a 1st degree burn. You take a 195 degree liquid and dump it on your arm sleeve, you won't have time to avoid a 3rd degree burn. Maybe you feel that, for a speeding offense, there is no difference between a $100 fine and serving 20 years in a maximum security prison, because the person was stupid enough to break the law and deserves *any* punishment. (I would argue the latter is way out of proportion to the crime.) If that's how you feel, fine. But you have a habit of implying that other people are idiots for seeing things differently than you.

Originally posted by mattson Geek, are you aware that the air in your oven could get as hot as 450 degrees? Madness, madness I tell you! You spill your coffee on your arm at home (because the kids run by and hit your chair), you have time to take off your shirt and run cold water. If the over makers are aware their products are too hot for human consumption, should we also sue them when they produce a fine hot pie? So, we are allowed to understand ovens are hot but not coffee? Would you sue McDs or your kids if they caused you to spill your coffee? I suspect McDs because we have to hold other's accountable. It is also not stupidity to spill stuff. It is stupid to drink coffee in a car if you can't control it. By the way, coffee is hot and burns, apparently bears repetition.

Originally posted by swimpastor Last weekend at one of the Y's that won't let me dive off the blocks, in the 'family fun' pool next to the lap pool, I saw a 12 year old ram into another 12 year at the bottom of the water slide - one of several now in Y's in this area. For a second I was concerned that a serious injury had just been dealt. Is that activity, the rules of use for which we expect 17 year olds to make judgements, monitor and regulate, inherently safer than having a trained and conscientious adult use a starting block. To think so in my eyes would be ludicrous hypocrisy. AND, if we can't depend on the 17 year olds to make judgements about safety then why on God's green earth are we paying them at all? An adult going off a starting block with the full force of gravity carries more force than a 12 year old half his size, who's being slowed by the friction of the slide -- many times more, in fact. It's basic high school physics. In fact, diving injuries can -- and do -- cause paralyzing or even fatal spinal injuries. The fact that it's evidently difficult for lifeguards to monitor the water slide, which is far less dangerous, seems like a good reason to me not to put them in the position of monitoring diving during public lap swim hours. As for depending on 17 year old (or even 40 year old) lifeguards to make those judgments, here's how it would work (or not work) in practice: You show up and tell the lifeguard you're an experienced masters swimmer -- as far as he knows you could be Mark Spitz or you could be Lipitor Dude. But let's say Lifeguard Kid knows you and there's an empty lane, so he let's you dive. But that means he has to watch that no other swimmer sees an empty lane and, not realizing what you're doing, decides to take it -- right while you're going off the block. So Lifeguard Kid has to focus on your lane, to make sure you don't land on another swimmer. Meanwhile, Lipitor Dude shows up and decides he'd like to try a few dives. Now, Lifeguard Kid knows Lipitor Dude is incompetent (he's seen the commercial :) ), but Liptor Dude, like many incompetent people, thinks he's Mark Spitz, Gary Hall (Sr. and Jr.) and Michael Phelps all rolled into one. So now Lifeguard Kid has to explain (argue, really) to Lipitor Dude why he won't let him dive, when he let's you dive. While all this is going on, he's distracted from watching the rest of the pool -- which is what we're paying him for. Notice I'm not talking about liability, lawsuits or spilled coffee -- I don't care about that. The issue is just a matter of common sense safety.

It seems that this argument comes down to 2 camps. A - Those who believe that that McDonalds bears no responsibility for the 3rd degree burns suffered by the 80 year old lady and that the temperature of the coffee is of no relevance. In addition that the history of other cases of spills causing burns should be ignored. A - "It was her fault for being stupid, that she got 3rd degree burns" B - Those that feel that McDonalds did not exercise due care in serving scalding hot coffee at a temperature that would cause 3rd degree burns within 3 seconds. Already knowing that people could spill this on themselves, had in the past, and that the temperature was unsafe. B - " Yes it was her fault that she spilt coffee on herself, BUT that the company knew that this could happen AND that the coffee was served at an unsafe temperature. " In my business life, and also when i am coaching kids, it is my responsibility to ensure that my actions or inaction does not cause an uneccessary degree of risk to others. McDonalds have a duty of care to take reasonable steps to ensure the safety of their customers. In this case their inaction in not lowering the coffee temperature, despite previous cases, was negligent in this duty. The 80 year old lady deserved to have messed up clothes and some skin redness from the coffee spill, she did not deserve to have skin grafts and 3rd degree burns.

Good post, Connie. I like the part about cold burgers causing accidents. I am now very concerned about consuming my daily power bar on the way to the pool, along with my piping hot, luxuriously steaming coffee. That combo could be deadly but since not produced at McDonalds I feel I am missing out on a potential money making endeavor.

Originally posted by Scansy I wonder if the woman had got a to go coffee (at 180degrees) from a small local diner and spilled it on her - would she have sued. At 180 degrees, she would have had a fighting chance to avoid 3rd degree burns, as opposed to 190 degrees, where she had virtually none. Originally posted by aquageek If the over makers are aware their products are too hot for human consumption, should we also sue them when they produce a fine hot pie? So, we are allowed to understand ovens are hot but not coffee? Geek, have you read your pie box? Last time I checked, it states that contents will be (too) hot, and it tells you how long to wait before consumption. There is nothing on a McDonald's cup that warns that contents are 10-40 degrees hotter than any other hot beverage you would normally get. (You keep equating 1st and 3rd degree burns.) Connie, good for you, that you take more precautions in more dangerous situations. I also agree that there needs to be more personal accountability in general. The problem is when the situation becomes more dangerous without your knowledge. Precautions that are reasonable for a normal hot beverage, become inadequate at 190 degrees. Let's try a metaphor. AquaG is practicing his dives, knows how to do a safe start into a 4 ft. deep pool. The markings on the side of the pool say "Shallow water" and "No diving without instructor". Well, it turns out one lane is only 2 ft deep, but because of an optical illusion, looked to be the same depth as the other lanes. No markings or signs to distinguish this special lane from the others. AG cracks his skull and spends time in the hospital. I come along and say, "AG was stupid, he knew the dangers of diving into a shallow pool". Connie comes along, and says that she always slides into the pool, so it is AG's fault for diving at all. Other people come along, and gripe that they won't let anyone start in any of the lanes, because of AG. Would you agree with all of this? Or would you complain (to management) that there should have been some sign that this lane was much shallower than the others?

I'm talking about adult lap swim periods (why would you think I wasn't?). I'm also describing what actually happened when my pool tried setting aside two lanes one night a week for practice springboard diving. The instructor (a 35 year old coach) assigned just to monitor those lanes had to spend all his time shooing away ADULTS who decided to swim in those lanes and arguing with incompetent divers. Needless to say, they stopped doing it -- imagine if a lifeguard who also had to watch the rest of the pool, had that responsiblity.

Originally posted by swimpastor We ameliorate the risk of auto accidents not by outlawing cars and drivers but rather by establishing traffic laws. ... I am suggesting that we can craft a set of rules for qualified and trained adult swimmers using starting blocks at appropriate times and places that ameliorates the risk to others that y'all are so concerned about. It seems to me that you have encountered the designated "traffic laws" at your YMCA regarding block starts. 1) Can't do it at all except under appropriate times/conditions. 2) Appropriate times/conditions are during formal team/coached workouts. All the rest of this thread contains little more than people's speculations about why those "traffic laws" exist.

Originally posted by aquageek Comical. play sharks and minnows anymore (the greatest pool game ever invented in the dive well). Since I didn't learn to swim until I was 39, this is a mystery to me. Please describe it. -LBJ

"Comical. First of all, in the US, if you are a coach, you know that every kid on your team has signed a waiver of liability for you, the facility and the organization." I am confused, does this mean that as long as someone has signed a waiver, that you have NO responsibility to take ALL reasonable steps to ensure their safety ? Waiver or no waiver, if you are reckless and allow or do not stop dangerous behaviour, you will and deserve to be sued if someone in your care gets hurt. With the McDonalds case it is all about the temperature it was served at. There was no case if the coffee was only hot , not scalding hot.:mad: