The Pittsburgh Penguins on Thursday broke their silence and provided new details about a man\u2019s 35-foot fall from the upper concourse of the arena during Monday night\u2019s game, leaving him critically injured.<\/p>\n
The team and Oak View Group, the venue\u2019s managing partner, \u201ccan confirm the patron was not using the designated staircase at the time of the incident,\u201d according to a joint statement. \u201cAnd the safety barrier remained intact.\u201d<\/p>\n
A witness who said he was seated nearby in Section 234 told TribLive the man was working his way higher into the section, walking upward across rows of empty seats, when he fell.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe started falling onto the bleachers, and every time he was trying to get his footing, he\u2019d step on a seat and the seat would flip over,\u201d Fabian Carrazana of Beechview told TribLive.<\/p>\n
The man fell back toward the upper-level railing at the lip of the arena\u2019s upper bowl, tumbling into a pane of glass, which cracked and gave way, Carrazana said.<\/p>\n
Jennifer Bullano Ridgley, a Penguins spokeswoman, would not answer questions Thursday about the incident or the stadium\u2019s steep pitch in its upper levels.<\/p>\n
The prepared statement was released less than a day after TribLive reported Carrazana\u2019s comments as well as concerns raised by spectators about the slope of parts of PPG Paints Arena.<\/p>\n
The Penguins and Oak View Group said their \u201ccollective thoughts\u201d are with the victim, who suffered \u201clife-threatening\u201d injuries. Authorities have not named the man.<\/p>\n
The PPG Paints Arena incident was the third of its kind since April in Pittsburgh, following one each at PNC Park and Acrisure Stadium.<\/p>\n
Related:<\/p>\n
\u2022 Dizzying heights at venues like PPG Paints Arena unsettle upper-level spectators<\/a> Justin Vellucci is a TribLive reporter covering crime and public safety in Pittsburgh and Allegheny County. A longtime freelance journalist and former reporter for the Asbury Park (N.J.) Press, he worked as a general assignment reporter at the Trib from 2006 to 2009 and returned in 2022. He can be reached at jvellucci@triblive.com<\/a>. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Pittsburgh Penguins on Thursday broke their silence and provided new details about a man\u2019s 35-foot fall from…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":261451,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[66],"tags":[385,99],"class_list":["post-261450","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-nhl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/261450","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=261450"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/261450\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/261451"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=261450"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=261450"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=261450"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\u2022 Officials release few details on man’s ‘life-threatening’ fall at PPG Paints Arena<\/a>
\u2022 Fan suffers life-threatening injuries in fall from upper-level stands at PPG Paints Arena<\/a><\/p>\n