A man died after leaping onto I-5 from the Madison overpass in an apparent suicide Sunday morning.
Traffic was backed up for miles during the emergency response in the northbound lanes of the freeway near the Convention Center. Seattle Fire confirms that the man was died of his injuries before arriving at the hospital.
In February, CHS reported on the lack of barriers on Seattle’s busy pedestrian overpasses over I-5.
This is the fourth I-5 jumping death CHS has reported on involving Capitol Hill and First Hill area overpasses since September. WSDOT and the City of Seattle say they do not track suicide statistics for the overpasses.
As I noted before ( http://tinyurl.com/cas9czy), historically only about 5 of Seattle’s ~ 66 suicides a year were from the Aurora Bridge, so we’ll never prove that the I-5 suicides were people who would otherwise have used the Aurora Bridge.
However 4 since September is higher that the Aurora Bridge average of 5 per year.
BTW jumping is only the 7th most common means of suicide in the US. Gunshots, overdoses and hangings are the top 3. http://frater.com/suicidelist.html
Suicide prevention is a worthy cause, but if we look at the big picture (~ 66 per year) and at the high cost of preventing ~5 per year from bridges, wouldn’t we be better off spending the money on social services and outreach to prevent suicides?
The drivers below getting hurt by a jumper would be very sad. I guess the jumper doesn’t care if their actions hurt other people though.
Mike, I don’t think you’re going to be able to hold a person in a dire situation like this accountable. I understand your point, but it’s as unfortunate as the situation itself.
Suicide by nature is a selfish act. Do you really think that somebody who wants to end their life realy cares about anybody else?
Actually yes, for example there are elderly couples who want to be in control of the time they die and don’t want to be a burden on their families. They commit suicide together. I would say they are not being entirely selfish and would never think of jumping off an overpass with the possibility of killing others who would prefer living.
Are there many cases of old people jumping off overpasses? That seems like a pretty weak argument.
we still have no good prevantion over people trying to make suicides on briges and over pass.. seattle have a buget putting up a farrieswheel on the water front but don’t have money just to keep people from jumping,killing them selves!!!.. this is sad!!!!!
Seattle does NOT have a budget for “putting up a ferris wheel”, that is private investment money.
If you up suicide prevention railings on the I-5 overpasses, then people will have to go the the Seattle Library interior balconies to jump.