Employees at a Californian radio station that held a "hold your wee for Wii" challenge have been fired after the death of one of the contestants.

As we reported earlier this week, 28-year-old Jennifer Strange died of "water intoxication" while taking part in a contest to see who could drink the most water without going to the toilet. The winner of the competition would win a Wii. However the publicity stunt ended in disaster when Ms Strange was found dead at her home by her mother the following day, having drunk almost two gallons of water during the challenge.

Radio Station KDND, 107.9 FM has now fired five members of the Morning Rave show, on which the competition was broadcast, and sacked a further five people.

Last night a chilling extract from the radio show appeared on the Sacramento Bee website. During the early stages of the contest one host joked about people dying after drinking too much water. One listener called Eva rang in to warn the station that contestants could die due to water intoxication. A host replied: "We're aware of that". Another then said: "They signed releases, so we're not responsible. It's OK".

As the competition came to a close Ms Strange complained her head was hurting. "They keep telling me though that it's the water, that it will tell my head to hurt and then it will make me puke," she said.

There have now been calls for criminal charges to be pressed against competition organizers at the station, although local sheriffs have said there are no grounds for prosecution.




edited on Jan. 17, 2007 05:43 pm by Batistablr_RF

hmm I really don't know what to say about this. I don't know how these things work, but my best guess is that the presenters need to have this kind of competition cleared and accepted by someone that works at the station. Not the presenters. I don't know what happened in this case, but I think the contestants are to blame aswell.

They signed the release, so that must say somewhere about the risks of drinking water. Now if it didn't say it, maybe they should have taken the advice from the caller.

It's a grey area, and yes it's tragic, but in my opinion, the contestants are as much to blame just because they didn't have to drink the water. *sigh*

I'm sure if they asked the contestants to play Russian-Roulette, Ms.Strange still would have played for that Wii.

Does anyone know how the person who came in second place is doing? It must have been a close match considering it was for a Wii. Wonder if they had the same symptoms, or could it have been Ms. Strange had medical problems to begin with.

Body mass, age, personal fitness condition would all account for different people reacting differently to the same conditions.

You and I could sit down and have 10 beers in front of each of us on a table. When finished, one of us would be drunk and one of us would be under the table talking to a nonexistant cat.... (That would be me).


The station should have had a medical doctor or specialist review the challenge and yay or nay it. It should have been nayed. 20 20 hindsight is always crystal clear. A medical specialist should have been onsite during the contest to monitor for problems.

A waiver is more often than not not worth the paper it is written on if the true possible ramifications arent spelt out precisely.

Tragedy yes, preventable yes but life goes on. Hopefully all tv and radio stations heed the results of this and use a bit more thought when planning these things. Contestants may be lucky enough to get a slot into these contests but that does not necessarily mean that they are smart enough to understand what they are getting into or when to say Uncle.....