Miracle Recreation Equipment Company Retrofits Tornado Spiral Slides To Prevent Strangulation

PRODUCT: Tornado spiral slides manufactured by the Miracle Recreation Equipment Company and sold nationwide from 1972 to 1991. Approximately 3,000 slides are believed to still be in use at schools, parks, and daycare centers.

PROBLEM: Children's jacket hood strings or other strings may get caught in spaces near the top of the slide and cause strangulation.

WHAT TO DO: Call Miracle Recreation at 1-800-523-4202 for a retrofit kit that will eliminate the spaces in which clothing strings may be caught.

WASHINGTON, DC -- In cooperation with the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC), Miracle Recreation Equipment Company of Monett, MO is voluntarily providing the owners of Tornado spiral slides with a retrofit kit to eliminate potentially hazardous spaces near the top of the slide in which jacket hood strings or other strings may catch and cause strangulation.

Miracle Recreation Equipment Company and CPSC have received reports of two incidents on Tornado slides in which children were found hanging by jacket hood strings and one incident involving a child caught by a key on a string around her neck. The strings caught in spaces near or at the top of the slides. The hanging incidents took place in Connecticut in 1983 and in Indiana and Iowa in 1992.

The Tornado spiral slides were sold nationwide from 1972 to 1991. The Tornado spiral slides are 10 to 16 feet high and have a colored fiberglass channel with a stainless steel bedway. Approximately 3,000 slides are believed to still be in use at schools, parks, and daycare centers.

Miracle Recreation Company is contacting Tornado slide purchasers by mail. Consumers should not allow children to play on the Miracle Tornado spiral slides until a retrofit is safely installed in the spaces between the pole and the slide. Consumers who need more information regarding any Tornado slide that needs a retrofit kit should contact Miracle Recreation Equipment Company toll-free at 1-800-523-4202.

Consumers who know of similar playground equipment hazards are urged to call the CPSC Hotline at 1-800-638-2772. CPSC continues to monitor incidents which involve children's clothing catching in spaces of all playground equipment and to work with industry to address those hazards.

CPSC is announcing this corrective action program as a part of its mission to protect the public from unreasonable risks of injury and death associated with consumer products. The Commission's objective is to reduce the estimated 28.5 million injuries and 21,600 deaths associated each year with the 15,000 different types of consumer products under CPSC's jurisdiction.