Click the play button on the video window to the see the story
Unsecured soccer goals have been blamed for the deaths of two children in Arizona this year.
Yet across the Valley, we've found unsecured and potentially fatal soccer goals still putting your children at risk.
This past spring, 10-year-old Gabriel Mendoza was killed at a YMCA in Phoenix when an unsecured soccer goal fell on his head.
Two months ago, 10-year-old Leonardo Herrera was killed in a similar tragic accident at a San Luis elementary school.
“It does not make sense that something that could have been avoided caused a tragedy,” said Herrera’s aunt Rosie Fierro.
Data from the Consumer Product Safety Commission shows unsecured soccer goals killed 30 children in as many years.
There have been eight accidents in Arizona, including the two recent deaths.
CPSC records show most accidents happen when kids climb or hang on the goals. Even a gust of wind has been blamed for knocking over an unsecured goal.
A federal government standard requires soccer goals be secured or anchored to the ground, using something like a metal hook or bolt and chain.
That's not what we found.
The ABC15 Investigators tested more than 100 schools and parks across the Valley.
We found 54 unanchored, unsafe goals. That's one out of five we tested.
One was at Pecos Park in Phoenix, another at Snedigar Sportsplex in Chandler and a third at Rio Vista Park in Peoria.
All three of those cities told us the goals should have been anchored. You can read their complete statements below.
We also found 26 unsecure goals in Scottsdale parks alone. They were mostly in Scottsdale Sports Complex, formerly CAP Basin, Mountain View and Chaparral parks.
At Chaparral, just days after the death in Yuma, we found 11 year olds playing a game where neither goal was secured to the ground.
We also found a young girl using a goal as a piece of playground equipment.
We warned her to stay off of it because it also had no anchors and nothing to stop it from toppling over.
“That would very much concern me,” said Bill Murphy, director of parks and recreation for Scottsdale. “What has made us aware is that you guys have contacted us. We have made it a priority.”
Scottsdale does have a policy that all goals must be anchored.
Murphy said he'll make sure the goals are secured and remain that way.
We also found 10 schools with dozens of unsecured goals including Cochise Elementary in Scottsdale, Challenger Middle School in Glendale and Squaw Peak Elementary in Phoenix.
The man in charge of all Arizona schools, Superintendent Tom Horne, said that even though a federal standard requires soccer goals be anchored, he can't make schools do it.
“The legislature has not given our department authority over those kinds of things.”
Meanwhile, some parents are left wondering what it will take to prevent another tragedy.
Is your school or park goal unanchored? Click "add a comment" below to let us know where.
You can also send in photos or video by clicking here.
Searchable Soccer Goal Database
To check the schools and parks that we inspected, select a city in the drop down window. The fields are mapped. To see the individual results, click on details.
