A coroner has confirmed the death of a British mother-of-two, attributed to a faulty bed that collapsed on her neck.
According to the BBC, Helen Davey was discovered by her 19-year-old daughter, Elizabeth Davey, on June 7th of this year.
The 39-year-old was reaching into the storage compartment when the mattress platform on her Ottoman-style bed unexpectedly dropped onto her in her northeast England residence.
This type of bed features an ottoman mechanism that allows access to storage space located beneath the mattress and inside the frame.
During a court hearing, Helen’s daughter Elizabeth recounted: “I went upstairs, my mam’s bedroom door was wide open and I saw her lying on her back with her head turned under the bed. Her legs were bent as if she was trying to get up.”
She further explained: “I dropped everything that I was holding and tried to lift the top of the bed off her head. The bed was no longer a soft close and could fall heavily if it was released.
“It was so heavy for me to lift it up and try to pull her out. I managed to lift it up enough to use my foot to support it. I noticed that her face was blue with a clear indent on her neck from the frame.”
Durham and Darlington senior coroner Jeremy Chipperfield noted in her report that one of the bed’s two gas-lift pistons was ‘defective’, which led to the ‘unexpected’ tragedy.
Chipperfield stated the incident resulted in Helen “trapping her neck against the upper surface of the side panel of the bed’s base.”
The inquest on October 4th determined Helen’s death to be accidental, citing ‘positional asphyxia’ as the cause.
Chipperfield mentioned in his report: “In my opinion there is a risk that future deaths could occur unless action is taken. In the circumstances it is my statutory duty to report to you.”
The coroner has subsequently communicated with the UK government’s business secretary and the Office for Product Safety and Standards to express concerns about preventing a similar tragedy in the future.
The Department for Business and Trade (DBT) expressed their condolences in a statement to the BBC: “This is a horrible tragedy and we’d like to express our sympathy to Helen’s friends and family.
“We’re carefully considering the coroner’s report to understand the circumstances in this case and if there is anything we can do to prevent tragedies like this in the future we will respond fully before the deadline.”
The DBT has been requested to outline a timetable of actions to prevent recurrence of such incidents in the future.