On August 5, as the heat index rose into the 90s, the air conditioning at Hopewell High School in Virginia failed and classes were canceled for the next day. Despite this, football training continued, and after about 40 minutes, a 15-year-old player collapsed.
“Probably heat stroke. He's a football player,” a coach told 911, according to a recording obtained by the Progress Index in Petersburg, Virginia. … We prepared ice and tried to put it on him.
Jervion Taylor was taken to hospital where he later died, the first death in a deadly month for young footballers.
Over the next three weeks, at least five high school and middle school football players died during practices or games, according to news reports. Among them was Leslie Noble IV, a 16-year-old Franklin High School lineman who also fell during practice on Aug. 14 and was remembered at a funeral in Randallstown on Wednesday. He is a gentle, happy giant.
The Maryland Medical Examiner has not yet released the teen's cause of death, but dispatchers that day mentioned heat stroke. Of the six athlete deaths identified in news reports, two suffered head injuries from tackles on the same day: 16-year-old Kaden Tellier of Selma, Alabama, and 13-year-old Madison, West Virginia. Years old Cohen Craddock.
In addition to Noble and Taylor, news reports also named Semaj Wilkins, 14, of New Brockton High School in Alabama and 15-year-old Semaj Wilkins of Northwest High School in Shawnee Mission, Kansas. Possibility of death of Ovet Gomez Regalado.
The deaths have left many approaching August shocked and saddened, both looking forward to the upcoming football season and fearing the dangers it will bring. Already a potentially dangerous sport due to its high-contact nature, record-breaking temperatures in recent years have increased the risks to athletes.
“You pray that you don't have any heat-related injuries in the summer,” said Marty McNair, who has become an advocate for player safety since the death of his son, Jordan, from heatstroke in college. . “As far as the death of a student-athlete, it’s horrific.”
Experts say that while it is difficult to discern trends in deaths among young athletes because the total numbers thankfully remain low, July and August tend to be the most dangerous for footballers.
“We don't want to see anything happen,” said Kristen Kucera, director of the National Catastrophic Sports Injury Research Center at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. “We are concerned about the number of deaths in August.”
Two of the three high school football deaths reported last school year occurred in July or August, according to the center. In the first two academic years (i.e. June 2022 and June 2023), 6 of the 11 academic years and 3 of the 7 academic years respectively occurred during the summer.
“Everyone is increasingly worried about heat across the board, not just in sports,” Kucera said.
Indeed, in Baltimore, Department of Public Works employee Ron Silver II died of fever on Aug. 2, prompting the city to suspend garbage collection and recycling Wednesday as temperatures climbed to 99 degrees.
The past 10 years have been the warmest in nearly 175 years on record, so there is an urgent need to find a way to protect those who work or play during the hot summer months.
Football will have to relinquish its traditional role as a fall sport, a leading heat researcher predicts.
“Twenty years from now, high school will be a spring sport,” said Douglas Casa, executive director of the Cory Stringer Institute at the University of Connecticut. “It's going to happen. Climate change is happening much faster than we think.
The institute, which studies and seeks to prevent heat-related deaths in sports, labor and the military, is named for the Minnesota Vikings linebacker who died after suffering a heat stroke in training camp in 2001.
Casa said the current football schedule puts the most vulnerable athletes through the most rigorous training at the most dangerous time of the year.
“You're taking 300-pound kids and putting all this gear on them in the hottest time of the year,” he said. “Big guys heat up faster and cool down slower.”
Casa helps multiple sports organizations, from National Athletic Trainers Associations to the International Olympic Committee, develop guidelines to keep athletes safe when practicing or competing in the heat.
In 2009, he co-authored a consensus statement in the Journal of Athletic Training outlining preseason heat acclimatization for middle school sports, which the Maryland Public High School Athletic Association recommends in its safety guidelines.
It is recommended that the first two days of football training should consist of helmets only. Days 3-5 add shoulder pads while introducing contact with the blocking sled and coping dummy. Full exposure should not begin earlier than day 6. It is recommended that the two exercises should be spaced at least three hours apart and conducted in a cool environment.
That's a concern given how quickly athletes can become dehydrated in hot weather, whether from sweating or heavy breathing, said Dr. Sunal Makadia, director of sports cardiology at LifeBridge Health, which operates Sinai Hospital and other facilities in Baltimore.
“This time of year, a lot of players may be new to the sport or have been out of shape over the course of the summer, but they're firing on all cylinders,” he said.
Makadia said heat can be dangerous for everyone, from otherwise healthy children to highly trained athletes to those who may have underlying heart conditions that were previously undiagnosed but present themselves on the training or competition field. Sick people.
As a parent and recreational league coach, Makadia recommends that children get checked by a doctor before participating in sports. That way, he said, doctors can check for any symptoms, medications or family history that could be causing the underlying problem.
Inspired by the tragic deaths, Maryland lawmakers passed two laws in the past three years to improve the safety of young athletes.
The Randallston native's death exposed the Terps' bullying culture as part of the 2021 passage of the Jordan McNair Safety and Fair Play Act, leading to the firing of the football coach and the resignation of the chair of the University System of Maryland Board of Trustees. The law addresses, in part, guidelines for preventing and treating brain injuries and heat-related illnesses in higher education.
McNair's death also prompted a bill in Congress to require colleges and universities to develop emergency heat plans, but the bill has not yet passed.
Changes at the middle and high school levels are also coming in 2022, a year after a 17-year-old Mergenthaler Vocational Technical High School football player died from a brain injury after being tackled in the end zone of a fall 2021 game. The Elijah Gorham Act requires middle schools and high schools to develop emergency operations plans, including having defibrillators and cooling equipment.
Kassa said he is relieved that it is increasingly common for schools to have automated external defibrillators (AEDs) and immersion tubs that can take life-saving measures on the scene before paramedics arrive.
Casa said no one should die from heatstroke. He said you only need to get players to cool down during the “golden half hour” after symptoms appear, which is why more than 80 percent of high schools now have soaking tubs.
“It's 100 percent survivable,” Casa said. “You have a bucket of ice and water, and your baby lives.”
Parents should ask if the school has plans and equipment to handle player crises, as well as on-site athletic trainers.
After hearing the news of Noble's death, Maryland Sen. Shelly Hettleman, who helped pass McNair and Gorham's legislation, conducted due diligence to ensure Franklin High School had adopted the recommendations for safety measure.
“There was a trainer there. There was an AED nearby. It sounds like people were reacting the way they should have reacted,” the Baltimore County Democrat said. “Sometimes things like this happen, and the tragic thing is, even if you have the best policies in place, I think that's what happened here.”
Now, Hertman wonders: Could further precautions be taken? What physical exams do these young athletes undergo before taking the field? Why does this happen more in football than in other sports?
“I think we should consider that as well,” Hertman said. “I don't hear about hockey players collapsing on their fields, right? Or cross country running?
According to the National Catastrophic Sports Injury Research Center, 65 catastrophic sports injuries occurred among high school or college athletes representing 10 sports in the 2021-22 school year, and 36.9% of them were fatal. Of the 65, 52.3% were football players and 53.9% had heart disease or heat-related illnesses.
Noble's death brought awareness to the issue again, as did the death of McNair, whose family lived in Hetman's area.
“This is a local tragedy,” Hertman said, “but it's within the context of larger issues happening to young athletes across the country.”
