As part of the celebrations at TwitchCon, which began Friday and will run through Sunday night, there’s a foam pit that streamers have jumped into after battling it out on some elevated platforms. gladiators-Style. Some of them were reportedly seriously injured.
Adriana Chechik has suffered the most alarming injury you can see in the video below (first shared by Clippy Chimpanzee) where she jumps off a small platform, spreads her legs, and then lands on her tailbone before turning around and saying, “I can’t get up.” Shortly thereafter, an announcer is heard saying “no no she’s fine”.
She was not well! Chechik later tweeted: “Well I broke my back in two places and am having surgery today to insert a meter stick for support. Send your support. When it rains it pours and I definitely feel the rain now.”
After her injury—and a call for others to get in touch from their friend EdyBotwho was the other person who jumped in the video above and who says she also injured her back – others shared reports of injuries they allegedly sustained in the same pit, such as a dislocated knee:
And another injured back:
And what also looks like an ankle injury:
While participants say the pit remained open despite others being injured before Chechik’s serious injury and that it reopened shortly thereafter, That The Washington Post says Nathan Grayson The attraction — a promotional collaboration between Intel and Lenovo — has since been shut down, both due to injuries and because attendees using it “broke rules.”
Participants like EdyBot say a possible cause of the injuries was the shallow pit; She describes it as “like three cubes deep,” while Grayson says that “the pit itself goes a little past my knee” and that it’s “shallow af.”
This can be seen pretty clearly in the video above; A foam pit is meant to swallow you up, but these guys bounce back pretty hard and fast after landing.
We have reached out to Twitch for comment on the situation and will update when we receive feedback.
UPDATE Monday, October 10, 12:50 p.m: A spokesman for Lenovo, at whose stand the incidents occurred, tells My box:
We are aware of incidents of TwitchCon attendees being injured in the soft foam pit of the gladiator game at the Lenovo booth. The area has since been closed to all further use while we work with the organizers to investigate the incidents.
