O'Briant said the Department of Labor has until February 1 to present its study to the legislature. House bill 39 calls for an inventory of zip lines in the state and local ordinances, along with a list of reported zip line accidents and an analysis of similar laws in other states. "The General Assembly will take those recommendations and decide what to do with them." "This sets up a study so that we will look to see whether regulations are necessary for zip lines, and we make our recommendations," O'Briant said. Neal O'Briant, spokesperson for the North Carolina Department of Labor, said his department does regulate carnival rides, like carousels and roller coasters, but the Amusement Device Safety Act exempts non-motorized aerial amusement devices, like zip lines, from oversight. The measure comes a month after a fatal zip line accident at Glade Valley's Camp Cheerio in Alleghany County. "We have to look at and honestly ask ourselves, did we make a mistake? Were we diligent?" The Alleghany County Sheriff's Office said the case is still under review.The General Assembly passed a measure this week that will examine whether the state needs to regulate aerial amusement devices. "What we have to do is we have to look at everything we did, good, bad or indifferent," he said. "We have certification training that our climbing staff went through and this instructor was one of our more mature staff." Ozmore said the camp is evaluating its operations in the wake of the accident. We inspect the zip line every year and we inspected it in the spring of this year," said Ozmore. "We do some dangerous things but we are always cognizant of safety. Ozmore said all safety precautions were followed. The zip lines are closed and off limits until an investigation is complete into what happened. Around 400 children are at Camp Cheerio this week and grief counselors are on site. With many new campers expected at Camp Cheerio Sunday, officials sent an e-mail to parents this weekend telling parents to talk to their children about Thursday’s tragic zip line accident that killed 10-year-old Bonnie Sanders Burney. "We've never had a tragedy like this." According to Burney's obituary, she just completed sixth grade cum laude at St. "This is the first major incident we've had in 60 years," Ozmore said. Around a dozen children and camp counselors were nearby at the time of the fall, but not all saw what happened, Ozmore said. Burney was taken to a nearby hospital, but Ozmore said the injuries from the fall were too severe to overcome. Camp Cheerio, located in Glade Valley in Alleghany County, is a resident camp of the YMCA of High Point. Ozmore said the camp has doctors and nurses on staff because of its remote location. EMTs were on site at the time and alternated CPR on Burney. Ozmore estimates the zip line has had more than 30,000 successful runs prior to the accident. This is the first death at Cheerio’s campgrounds in the camp’s history. Ozmore said the zip line became tangled to another line that ran parallel which cut the line and she fell about two stories to the ground. Camp Cheerio is accredited by the American Camp Association and has hosted tens of thousands of campers since 1960. WILMINGTON, NC (WECT) - A memorial service for a child from Wilmington who died in a zip line accident will be held Monday.īonnie Sanders Burney, 12, was killed in a zip line accident Thursday at Camp Cheerio in Glade Valley, according to the Alleghany County Sheriff's Office.Īccording to David Ozmore, the CEO of the YMCA of High Point, which runs Camp Cheerio, Burney fell from the zip line while tethered over land. Alleghany County authorities are investigating an accident at a camp.
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