Four people were hospitalized following carbon monoxide exposure at a Minnesota hotel. The fire department was called to the Rochester La Quinta Inn and Suites on November 4, when several people reported experiencing various symptoms after swimming in the pool. Fire department crews arrived to a partial evacuation taking place. At the time, a chlorine or carbon monoxide leak was suspected.
Crews investigating the pool area with monitors discovered highly elevated carbon monoxide levels. Gas utilities were shut off to prevent possible further production of carbon monoxide, and large positive-pressure fans were used to ventilate the building, according to a fire department news release.
Three adults and one child required immediate medical attention.
Cindy Clement, a licensed practical nurse at the Mayo Clinic, was at the hotel attending a birthday party when she heard screaming. Clement administered CPR to an unconscious 3-year-old girl with blue lips and no pulse, who had passed out near the pool.
'I couldn't feel a pulse at all, so I started CPR on her and she came back after less than a minute,” Clement said. “But she still wouldn't wake up; she'd open her eyes and pass right out again.”
The child’s mother, Jordyn Tipton, said that her daughter Rosalind’s recovery was a challenge. “The entire trajectory of our lives changed in just the 30 minutes this incident took place,” Tipton said.
Along with the other victims, the Tipton family is being represented by Gordon Johnson, a Chicago-based attorney who specializes in carbon monoxide cases.
“I’ve represented well over 100 carbon monoxide poisoning cases, and Rosalind is probably as close to death as anybody I’ve ever represented,” Johnson said.
According to Johnson, pool heaters seem to represent nearly half of the serious carbon monoxide poisonings that make the news. “For numerous reasons, these heaters seem to get neglected more than the main HVAC in some hotels,” Johnson’s website states.
Johnson says that incidents like these are easily avoided with a carbon monoxide detector, which could have been installed in the main pool area.
“It’s simply a matter of going down to the Home Depot and getting one and putting it in every room,” Johnson said.
But Minnesota, and many other states, have no specific laws requiring them in public places, CO
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as they do with smoke detectors.
According to Minnesota State Statute 299F.51: all new buildings considered to be dwellings must have a carbon monoxide detector within 10 feet of a room considered to be a bedroom or room for sleeping. This law does not mention anything about requiring these detectors in public places, such as a pool area.
“Since this, we have learned this is a recurring nightmare that has happened dozens of other times at hotels throughout the country,” Tipton wrote on her Facebook page. “There are no laws requiring the hotel industry to have a carbon monoxide detector in their rooms or public spaces. These pool heaters are ignored for years and end up killing and hurting people.”
