73-year-old man dies after falling off roof while removing snow from vacant house

Snow and typhoons, invariably some old guy will either get blown off or slip off and die. Sad.

According to police, Gunji Ichiyama and three other people were removing snow from the roof at around 8 a.m. when he apparently lost his footing and fell to the ground, NTV reported. 

The others found him 30 minutes later on his back buried in a pile of snow on the ground. He was taken to the hospital, but was later confirmed dead.  

Must have been one hell of a big roof if the 3 other people didnt notice one of the people missing!

It feels like I read this article last year. And the year before that…

Another massive snowstorm, another tragedy. Either try and clear the roof or potentially be buried alive. Got to feel for people up there.

An avoidable tragedy..

Haven’t I read this story a few times before?

According to police, Gunji Ichiyama and three other people

The man's name is Uchiyama, and two, not three other men were clearing snow with him.

Moderator: Thanks for pointing that out. The story has been corrected.

RIP Uchiyama San!

As we age, we need to be more careful.

RIP

Poor fella. Record snow this week so everyone around there will be knackered.

Parts of Uonuma are quite built up. If you do not have much land around your house, you cannot build a steep roof, because it will dump snow onto your neighbours. Instead, you have to build a flat or gradual roof that needs to be shoveled. This is especially tragic since he was doing this for an akiya.

" Instead, you have to build a flat or gradual roof that needs to be shoveled. "

Gabled rooves in densely populated northern European cities that routinely get heavy snowfall have existed for quite some time and eliminate the need for suicidal roof cleaning. Probably about time building codes are revised to reduce these senseless deaths weread about each winter.

Gabled rooves in densely populated northern European cities that routinely get heavy snowfall have existed for quite some time and eliminate the need for suicidal roof cleaning. Probably about time building codes are revised to reduce these senseless deaths weread about each winter.

Then the Dai Fung wind pressures come and treat gabled roofs like an aerofoil, tearing the leeward tiles off.

Areas subject to typhoons have flat roofs for a really good reason. There is no one size fits all in mother nature, apart from the G.O. affliction that all of us hoomans cannot avoid.

Uonuma gets way more snow than Europe. There is really no comparison.

fwiw, the roof this guy was shovelling was a gable roof. He was found off the roof on top of the snow pile but the hospital said he had no physical injuries and have proclaimed it a 病死, which probably means a stroke or heart attack. Its always worth having a read before jumping to conclusions.

https://news.ntv.co.jp/n/teny/category/society/teee27893241c6410c96cad43810a4ba15

At least two more deaths from snow today, ladies in the eighties and nineties. The one in Sakai mura, just about the snowiest inhabited place in the world, was hit by snow off her roof.

When we get old our minds say one thing and our bodies say another!

In the informative video posted by KohakuEbisu, the depth of the snow reaches to the roof of the worthless, abandoned 100-year-old one-story shack which the unfortunate victim fell off. Shockingly, at the 23-second mark in the same video, a man wearing an orange jacket can be seen clearing snow from the roof of a modern two-story house without wearing a safety harness and not attached to a safety line... sheer madness!

Removing snow from a roof can be done quickly with a chain or a rope