A local girl was hit on the head with a heavy rock at the Rotary Spray Park yesterday, after an unidentified vandal stuffed the water buckets with chunks of asphalt.
It was a beautiful late summer day on Wednesday when Mary Fisher’s 12-year-old daughter took advantage of the heat and enjoyed the refreshment of the water park. But what should have been a fun exercise turned horrific when, standing underneath the water buckets, she was struck directly on the head with a large piece of asphalt. She was rushed to the hospital, but luckily was found to have only suffered a cut to the head and bruising.
But the outcome could have been a lot worse for the young girl, and worse still for a younger, smaller child.
“You just don’t want to see some little one get hurt. I’m lucky my daughter wasn’t really hurt,” said Mary Fisher. “I don’t want this to happen to anyone else.”
Fisher said that a nurse at the hospital told her she had been at the park earlier in the week and had seen debris fall from the buckets then as well, though no injuries were reported in that incident.
The buckets dump their contents every ten minutes, and had been dispensing only water for a consistent period of time before the asphalt struck Fisher’s daughter. After the incident, older kids that were at the park investigated and found similar rocks and chunks packed into the other two buckets as well. The running water and constant pouring motion of the buckets seemingly loosened the chunks over time, making it hard to determine when the perpetrator or perpetrators had actually placed them inside.
The Town of Athabasca has been made aware of the incident. Chief administrative officer Doug Topinka said that if not for the unusually hot weather this week, the Spray Park would have already been closed for the season. He added that the town would reevaluate the park after the weekend.
Town staff is already considering how to prevent an incident like this from happening again.
“We do check the equipment daily, which means somebody put (the asphalt) in after it was up and running. That being said, what we’re looking at doing is putting some sort of screen or protective device over top of the buckets.”
Whatever fix is implemented will not be ready until next year, but the equipment checks will be increased for the remainder of the park’s operation this year.
It’s the first time in the three years of the park’s existence that anything like this has happened.
“Somebody found a new way to be vicious, I guess,” said Topinka. “The park is used by small children. It’s a pretty low attack.”
Sergeant Brian Scott, detachment commander of the Athabasca RCMP, was also appalled by the actions of the unknown perpetrator.
“It’s just idiotic; plain and utter ignorance,” he said. “It’s obviously some idiot doing something he or she thinks is funny, which is not.”
Scott said the issue falls under the mischief section of the criminal code, and encourages anyone with information to contact the Athabasca RCMP at 780-675-5122.
