Teen sadly died in bathtub while using mobile phone

Our deepest condolences to the family of a US teen who died while taking a bath after it is believed she touched her mobile phone that was charging nearby.

The fourteen-year-old Texas girl, Madison Coe, was electrocuted on Sunday morning. It is believed she either plugged in her phone, or grabbed it while it was plugged into a charger nearby.

“There was a burn mark on her hand, the hand that would have grabbed the phone. And that was just very obvious that that’s what had happened,” her emotional grandmother Donna O’Guinn told KCBD in Texas.

Madison’s grieving family hopes news of the tragedy will help educate others of the dangers of plugging in electrical appliances near water, and potentially prevent other deaths.

“This is such a tragedy that doesn’t need to happen to anyone else. And we want something good to come out of this as awareness of not using your cell phone in the bathroom as it is plugged in and charging,” Ms O’Guinn said.

“It’s overwhelming to realize that there are people that we don’t even know and we’ll probably never even meet that have taken this message and shared it to protect another child or even an adult. We don’t want to lose anybody.”

The teen’s death came seven months after a similar story of a London man who was electrocuted in the bathtub by an iPhone connected to a charger.

What MoM says

How tragic! And very scary. We bet there are heaps of kids out there who do this. Nikki from MoM said, “my children sometimes watch a show with their iPad on the bathroom counter (not within reach of the bath and definitely not on charge) so please be aware of the dangers. Although really, I guess it’s no different to a hairdryer/straightener.”

PLEASE teach your kids to never touch their device if they are using it around water even if they’re ‘just watching’ a text could easily come in and they’ll get tempted to touch!

Mums are also guilty as stated below so please be careful!

A new study from Netflix has found that mums often watch Netflix while multitasking — specifically while in the BATHROOM.

57% of mums say they watch Netflix while doing laundry, 48% say they watch while making dinner, and a whooping 40% percent they’ll watch Netflix in the bathroom.

Via Hello Giggles

Our thoughts are with this family at such a tragic time

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21 Comments

- - mom266216 said
  - 28 Oct 2017
    10:39 am
These days I heard so many tragic news happening all around the world just because of these gadgets. Need to be very carefulॉ.

- - mom94125 said
  - 05 Sep 2017
    10:52 am
that is sad. It’s just not something that you hear about happening. poor girl. we try to make sure that the kids are sitting down on the couch with technology and not walking around because they drop them and it is expensive to replace screens and or devices so i wouldn’t want my kid using them in the bathroom near water

- - mom183717 said
  - 02 Sep 2017
    1:35 pm
oh dear that is so sad.

- - ella12 said
  - 17 Jul 2017
    4:28 pm
This is just devastating and sad, RIP.

- - rainemac said
  - 17 Jul 2017
    4:54 am
My condolences to her family & friends,thank you for posting,as it’s something a lot of teens would not realise

- - taynik46 said
  - 16 Jul 2017
    10:26 pm
my eldest has just started watching youtube on her tablet in the bathroom – (not plugged in though) – but I will now be reminding her of what can happen when electricity and water mix – thank you for the article.

So sorry about the young girl in the article though, it must have been a terrible thing to find

- - tessie said
  - 16 Jul 2017
    2:45 am
Such a tragedy for the family to go through. The loss of a lovely young girl with her whole life ahead of her. My deepest sympathy to the family

- - hopefullyheidi said
  - 15 Jul 2017
    12:14 am
So very sad. What an awful thing to happen.

- - mom93821 said
  - 14 Jul 2017
    5:54 pm
This so very tragic and sad.

- - Ellen said
  - 14 Jul 2017
    3:10 am
Very sad indeed ! My thought and prayers go out to the family.
I showed this article to my 11 and 13 year old. So far my kids have not taken their devices in the bathroom, hope they never will.

- - mom101628 said
  - 13 Jul 2017
    10:47 pm
So, so sad – electricity and water don’t mix. But most young adolescents wouldn’t think of their phone as an electrical device.

- - BellaB said
  - 13 Jul 2017
    4:22 pm
Very sad. I think people get complacent with phones.

- - sars_angelchik said
  - 13 Jul 2017
    1:38 pm
Very scary! It’s not as obvious as the whole hairdryer thing so I think a lot of people wouldn’t even think of it when charging a phone.

- - robyn_smithwick said
  - 12 Jul 2017
    11:48 pm
Such a terrible tragedy.

- - Missey Grace said
  - 12 Jul 2017
    7:09 pm
How very sad to hear a young life is wasted this way.
We should drum the caution to the ears of our kids.
It’s never OK to mix bathroom with charged devices.

- - mom206279 said
  - 12 Jul 2017
    6:03 pm
Its something that is just so obvious you’d forget that maybe your kids don’t know. Heart goes out to the family.

- - rovermum said
  - 12 Jul 2017
    5:16 pm
OMG, I would never have considered this as something that could ever happen. I have never heard of this happening before. I will certainly share this with my teen son as a teaching moment. My thoughts are with this family. Such a freakish and tragic accident.

- - june11 said
  - 12 Jul 2017
    2:48 pm
Such a tragic loss of life at such a young age.
I remember a person in our suburb having a problem with something electrical, either the HWS or Air Conditioner. He got up on this house roof which was wet and touched either the roof or an appliance with his hands and didn’t have leather gloves or shoes on. He was electrocuted and died immediately.
Warning do not touch anybody who has been electrocuted unless you are wearing rubber gloves (not sure what the current precautions are) or you could be electrocuted too.

- - mom90758 said
  - 12 Jul 2017
    2:46 pm
Oh my! Such a young girl! There is surely more need to talk about how dangerous it is to use electronic devices near water.

- - mom112217 said
  - 12 Jul 2017
    2:07 pm
Very sad to read such a young life gone.