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Winnipeg Free Press - PRINT EDITION

Pulled to safety after hours in well

By: Mary Agnes Welch

16/11/2009 1:00 AM | Comments: 12

Rescue crews pull a 52-year-old man from a well just off McPhillips Street Sunday afternoon.

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Rescue crews pull a 52-year-old man from a well just off McPhillips Street Sunday afternoon. (RUTH BONNEVILLE@FREEPRESS.MB.CA)

Conway Whitstone and Vanessa Truden heard man yelling in well.

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Conway Whitstone and Vanessa Truden heard man yelling in well.

A man spent five hours trapped in an old well near the McPhillips Street casino before a couple out for a walk heard his cries for help and called 911.

The 52-year-old man, whose identity has not been released, fell almost eight metres into an old cement well located in a park behind a Manitoba Hydro electrical substation just off McPhillips Street near Logan Avenue.

He spent five hours standing in ankle-deep water, calling for help and banging metal bars together to make noise.

"It's lucky we walked by when we did. He could have been down there for days," said Conway Whitstone, who was walking in the park Sunday with his girlfriend, Vanessa Truden.

While his girlfriend ran to a nearby coffee shop to call 911, Whitstone stayed with the man, who appeared to have broken his ankle during the fall.

Rescuers from the Winnipeg Fire Paramedic Service set up a tripod over the well and lowered a firefighter and a harness down to the man. The well smelled like a sewer, so fresh air was pumped down to the bottom. There was barely enough room at the base of the well for the firefighter to get the man rigged up in a harness and backboard so he could be hoisted up.

Even so, it took less than an hour for rescuers to hoist the man out of the well and send him to Health Sciences Centre.

The man's feet were bloodied but he was conscious.

Police said they hoped to interview the man in his hospital room Sunday night, to find out if he knew how the heavy grate cover had been moved and how he'd come to fall down the well, which is 1.2 metres above the ground.

The man did not respond to a Free Press interview request.

Acting district chief Chuck Jonasson said firefighters have rescued people from wells before but it's not common. It's not clear how or why the man ended up in the well, he added.

The well, a barrel-shaped cement structure that protrudes 1.2 metres above ground, was covered by a heavy metal grate that had been removed, though it's not clear by whom.

It took two firefighters to hoist the grate into place following the rescue.

Jonasson said the city was asked to bolt the grate into place. The well could have been connected to an old reservoir located off Logan Avenue.

maryagnes.welch@freepress.mb.ca

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition November 16, 2009 A3

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12 Commentscomment icon

i live in the are and that is the first time some 1 did this,i do not know how come thank god the man and lady found him,

There is a difference between an "accident" and an "on purpose." If people fiddle around with things like a man-hole or well cover and/or put themselves in a precarious position, like hoisting themselves up 1.2 metres onto the ledge of a well, then it is no longer an accident.

WTG Conway and Vanessa!! For whatever reason the guy got in there you did the right thing!! YAY!!

Curiosity, that may be how he got in there. I was at the Kilcon park a few months ago, and while the kids were playing around the shelter that is there, we noticed the cover was loose on one of the well shafts. Upon closer inspection, the whole cover, albeit locked, was in fact completly unsecure and able to be removed. People, we need to respect the fact that accidents just do happen.

Nice to see the couple may have saved his life. But... how did he get there. Another bill for the city from a person who clearly should not have been "climbing" into the well. Obviously he did not stumble into a 4 foot high opening.


This story is a good example of the kinds of hollow, pointless comments that people should refrain from posting.

Jason, you are not the only one who is wondering how he managed to get into a well with the opening being that high above ground when the cover was removed somehow. Being careless perhaps?

1.2 meters is pretty much 4 feet. Now, whether the cover was off or not...how does one fall into a well that has a 4 foot high wall ? Maybe people who get themselves into these kind of situations, should have to pay the costs incurred by the city ?

I am the only person wondering how he even got down there in the first place?

He had to make a real effort to get into that hole, over that concrete barrier, and remove the seal. Doesn't seem like he was ok when he did this! He is lucky. Thanks to the passers-by

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