Boat jumping incidents in Alabama cannot be attributed to social media, law enforcement says
The head of an Alabama rescue squad who said at least four people had died while attempting a social media challenge where people jump off of moving boats and hit the water now says he cannot say the deaths were linked to this challenge. Alabama law enforcement officials also tell NBC News that they do not have any record of deaths resulting from an online trend.
On July 5, NBC News’ Birmingham affiliate WVTM reported that at least four people had died in Alabama attempting to leap out of moving boats. Capt. Jim Dennis of the Childersburg Rescue Squad told another local Alabama news outlet that four people had died in the state over the past six months after jumping out of boats.
“Last six months we have had four drownings that were easily avoidable,” he said. “They were doing a TikTok challenge.”
On July 10, TODAY aired a segment about the dangers of the social media challenge, citing Dennis. Later that day, however, Dennis told AL.com that his initial remarks were taken out of context.
“We’ve had four drownings in the last six to eight months (that the Childersburg Rescue Squad worked) and some of those were just drownings,’’ he told the outlet. “To say (social media is) the reason they died, I can’t say that,’’ he said. “That would be a matter of opinion.”
NBC News has made several attempts to reach out to Capt. Jim Dennis via text and phone and has been unable to reach him for further comment.
In a follow-up statement to NBC News on July 12, The Alabama Law Enforcement Agency’s (ALEA) Marine Patrol Division said they do not have any record of boating or marine-related fatalities in Alabama that can be directly linked to TikTok.
TikTok said in a statement to NBC News it has added warnings on some of its videos that note “participating in this activity could result in you or others getting hurt.”
“It’s not accurate to characterize or report this as a TikTok challenge,” TikTok said in the statement, adding the company “can’t comment on something that isn’t a trend on our platform.” On July 9, before the segment aired, NBC News also reached out to Meta and YouTube and did not receive comment.
CORRECTION: July 12, 4:15 p.m. The segment that aired with this story has been removed after the official who blamed four deaths on a social media challenge has now said that he could not say the deaths were linked to the challenge. This article has been updated to reflect the latest information from Alabama law enforcement.
This article was originally published on TODAY.com
