With Frosh in full swing, a youth fell while scaling the MacDonald Engineering building and was taken from the scene by ambulance Wednesday. McGill Security Services confirmed that the youth was neither a McGill student nor a Montreal resident, and was under 18, but he has not been identified. It is unclear what injuries the youth sustained.
Pierre Barbarie, Associate Director of University Safety, confirmed reports that the youth had been practicing parkour, a recreational activity that involves navigating urban landscapes by climbing, running, and jumping over obstacles.
Barbarie believed that the youth was under 18. “I think he went to [the Montreal Children’s Hospital] because the ambulance driver said [the individual] was not 18,” Barbarie said Friday afternoon.
He also said that alcohol was likely not a factor in the accident, based on the way the youth’s friend responded to questions from Security Services. Barbarie could not be reached for comment on Thursday, and Security Services declined to comment on the incident until today.
According to a friend who was present at the time of the incident, the youth was climbing the façade of MacDonald Engineering when he fell. Barbarie, who says the fall took place at roughly 5:10 p.m., recounted the friend’s version of the events: “He scaled…, got up to above the main door, like, I don’t know if you’d call it a statue, and then his hand slipped on that, and then he fell to the ground, hit the second step, and then fell backwards and hit his head.”
According to SSMU VP Internal Tom Fabian, who received his information from a Security Services administrator, security staff present at the scene of the accident did not see any blood where the youth fell.
Unsure how Security Services found out about the accident, Barbarie said, “We did not see the individual fall.”
However, within a minute of the youth’s fall, a Security Services staff member had informed Barbarie of what had happened. Following that, “there were 5 people on it within the thirty second mark…after we were advised.”
“There was a 911 call being made by a student…and we were making the same 911 call,” said Barbarie. Within five minutes, fire trucks, police cruisers, and an ambulance were on the scene. Fabian said that according to his source “the ambulance did not rush off.”
*An earlier version of this article incorrectly stated that the youth fell from the McConnell Engineering building, and that he was trying to perform a back flip when he fell. The Daily regrets the errors.