Man remains hospitalized after being burned in Parkour incident
WEST PALM BEACH — Savana Harrison described her younger brother, David, as someone who always has been the adventurous type.
As a child, David frequently climbed trees and practiced the moves of one of his favorite anime characters. Despite his small frame, he joined his high school’s football team.
So it was little surprise to her that David would take an interest in Parkour, a military-style exercise in which people move over obstacles by running, jumping, flipping and other forms of movement.
But it was a Parkour-related incident in downtown West Palm Beach that now has David fighting for his life.
The 20-year-old Delray Beach man was severely burned the night of Aug. 1 when he accidentally touched a live, overhead power line as he and two teenage friends attempted to cross over a concrete beam attached between two Florida Power & Light poles.
On Friday, David Harrison remained hospitalized in critical condition in the burn unit at Jackson Memorial Hospital in Miami, where he has been since the night of the incident.
“(He’s) not well,” Savana said Friday afternoon. “He’s still unconscious. He’s got burns on 70 to 80 percent of his body and he’s got a brain injury.”
Doctors have warned that her brother could remain in the hospital for months and could face a long road to recovery, she said.
According to West Palm Beach police, Harrison and two 19-yearold men were practicing Parkour on top of buildings near Clematis Street and Dixie Highway late that night.
Police said the three men had climbed up a metal pipe to the roof of the building at 314 Clematis St. and walked westward toward the building at 100 S. Dixie Highway. Harrison was attempting to jump to the building at 120 S. Dixie Highway when he climbed onto the concrete beam, police said.
According to the police incident report made public Thurs-
day, Harrison was about halfway across the beam when he accidentally touched the live wire. He fell to the ground as the upper part of his body caught fire. The two teens with him immediately climbed down from the building to help him. A nearby worker who witnessed the incident rushed to his truck to retrieve a painter’s cloth and used it to put out the fire, according to the report.
Police closed their investigation into the incident Wednesday and said that no charges will be filed.
Until Harrison’s injury, no serious injuries from Parkour had been reported in West Palm Beach, a police spokesman said. But this is not the first serious Parkour injury reported in Florida.
In November, a man fell from a three-story building in Cocoa while practicing Parkour, the Orlando Sentinel reported. The man was found face down on the ground with serious head trauma.
Savana said that she and her husband had cautioned David to be careful with his Parkour activities.
“He loves that Parkour stuff,” she said “He’s a 20-year-old kid who has Superman syndrome. He thinks he’s strong and can climb to high heights and nothing is going to happen to him, which is every 20-yearold.”
She described David as sweet and thoughtful, once remembering her favorite childhood superhero when he sent her a painting last Christmas.
“It’s unfortunate that this happened to him because this doesn’t deserve to happen to anybody,” she said. “You wouldn’t wish this on your worst enemy.”
She said that her brother loves sports, rooting for the Miami Dolphins and the Denver Nuggets. He graduated in 2016 from Olympic Heights High School in Boca Raton, where he played football and basketball. Since graduation, David has been taking classes at Palm Beach State College and working as a busboy at Abe & Louie’s restaurant near the Town Center at Boca Raton mall.
David grew up in the Boca area, but most recently has been living in Delray Beach.
Since the injury, Savana, who also grew up in Boca and now lives in Orlando, has spent every day by her brother’s side, along with her husband and a family friend. The siblings’ father passed away earlier this year and Savana, 25, has assumed responsibility for her brother’s medical care.
A GoFundMe page has been set up to help with David’s medical expenses. As of Saturday evening, the account had reached $4,035 of its $12,000 goal.
Savana said that she hopes what happened to her brother will serve as a cautionary tale for others practicing Parkour.
“We sincerely hope this will help people understand the dangers of this sport and that no one ever has to go through an accident as unfortunate as this one,” she said.