By Tim Binnall
A 'team-building' event in Switzerland took a disastrous turn when dozens of people needed medical attention following a firewalk that went inexplicably awry. The bizarre incident reportedly occurred on Tuesday evening at a gathering for employees of the Swiss media marketing company Goldbach. With an aim towards building camaraderie among the staff, the event featured a "team activity" in the form of a bed of burning coals which willing workers were encouraged to walk across with their bare feet. Although something of a fairly safe staple at such corporate retreats around the world, in this instance the firewalk wound up being a very bad idea.
Moments after they completed their stroll across the hot coals, several employees began complaining that their feet were in tremendous pain. This led the company to call for medical help and, when ambulances arrived on the scene, a staggering 25 people were found to be injured following their firewalk. Incredibly, thirteen of those individuals suffered burns that were serious enough to necessitate a trip to the hospital. Authorities are understandably investigating the situation as no one seems to know how or why so many people were hurt from performing the normally harmless exercise.
For their part, the company issued an internal memo wherein they acknowledged what occurred on Tuesday evening and stressed that those who participated in the activity had done so on their own accord. This was echoed by a spokesperson for Goldbach, who told a Swiss media outlet that "the message on site was: Nobody is forced, everything is voluntary." While the team-building exercise undoubtedly did not unfold as the company envisioned, one imagines that it did serve as something of a bonding experience among the employees who needed to be hospitalized because their feet were so badly burned from the fiery activity.