13-year-old girl dies days after snow fort collapsed on her in Châteauguay
Posted February 21, 2025 10:30 am.
Last Updated February 21, 2025 12:19 pm.
A 13-year-old-girl has died, days after a snow fort collapsed on her in Châteauguay, south of Montreal.
Châteauguay police confirmed the teen’s death on Friday morning, without providing further details.
Const. Erika Grondin said police are still investigating and the coroner will determine the circumstances surrounding the death.
The teen had been in hospital since the incident occurred on Tuesday afternoon.
Calls came in to 911 around 4 p.m. about the girl found unconscious outside of her home after an incident involving snow.
On Tuesday evening, Éric Allard, Mayor of Châteauguay, said the news came as a “shock” to the community.
“We had City Council and I made a message saying that it was dangerous, ‘Please be careful for those installations, especially when there’s no removal process. Be careful,’” he said.
“The city made a post on Facebook warning the citizens to be careful with that kind of installation, with that kind of game, and then that happened. It was really a shock for us.”
Allard had reiterating his call for children and parents to be prudent playing in snow, especially in making tunnels and forts.
On Friday, Dr. Mélanie Labrosse, a pediatric emergency medicine physician at CHU Ste-Justine, advised parents and everyone to pay attention and supervise children when they are playing outside. “It will be important […] to tell them that they should avoid to dig deep tunnel in the in the mountain of snow and to avoid to put their head on inside this, because it’s special this week that we have that amount of snow – and it could fall on on them.”
—With files from The Canadian Press
