In the wake the 2020 Mardi Gras tragedy where a woman was run over and killed by a tandem float, changes are coming to make tandem floats safer.
The solution? A netted barrier between the float tandems.
The Mayor’s Mardi Gras Advisory Council met Wednesday to draft an ordinance requiring every krewe with a tandem float, to install some sort of safety barrier between the gap of the tandem float’s halves, preventing anyone from passing between, while maintaining the appearance of the elaborate float.
“It’ll be akin to what you see at construction sites, that orange flexible fencing that’ll be affixed to the floats,” said James Reiss co-chair of the Mayor’s Mardi Gras Advisory Council. “It’ll still be something that you can see through to allow police and law enforcement or first responders to see if there is anyone or anything between the two floats.”
“It’s going to have to be something that’s so simple, so easy to install and interchangeable between floats, “said Barry Kern at Wednesday’s advisory meeting.
The change comes after a woman walked between the parts of a tandem float during a Nyx parade last year. She died after the float ran her over.
Kern Studios released a rendering of what the barrier could look like.
“Carnival has gotten so big in the last 20 years, there’s more and more of these tandem floats now, and hopefully it’ll stop another unfortunate accident from happening,” said Kern.
