Jimi Heselden
Encyclopedia
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
entrepreneur. A former coal miner
Coal mining
The goal of coal mining is to obtain coal from the ground. Coal is valued for its energy content, and since the 1880s has been widely used to generate electricity. Steel and cement industries use coal as a fuel for extraction of iron from iron ore and for cement production. In the United States,...
, Heselden made his fortune manufacturing the Hesco bastion
Hesco bastion
The HESCO bastion is both a modern gabion used for flood control and military fortification and the name of the British company that developed it in the late 1980s. It is made of a collapsible wire mesh container and heavy duty fabric liner, and used as a temporary to semi-permanent dike or barrier...
barrier system. In 2010, he bought Segway Inc., maker of the Segway personal transport system
Segway PT
The Segway PT is a two-wheeled, self-balancing transportation machine invented by Dean Kamen. It is produced by Segway Inc. of New Hampshire, USA. The name "Segway" is a homophone of "segue" while "PT" denotes personal transporter....
. Heselden died in 2010 from injuries apparently sustained falling from a cliff whilst riding a Segway. His estate, bequeathed to his widow and family, was worth over £340 million and he was ranked in the top 400 members of the Sunday Times Rich List
Sunday Times Rich List
The Sunday Times Rich List is a list of the 1,000 wealthiest people or families in the United Kingdom, updated annually in April and published as a magazine supplement by British national Sunday newspaper The Sunday Times since 1989...
.
Early life
Heselden grew up in the Halton MoorHalton Moor
Halton Moor is a district of east Leeds, West Yorkshire, England, located around three miles east of Leeds city centre and is close to the A63. It is situated between Killingbeck to the north, Temple Newsam to the south, Osmondthorpe to the west and Halton and Colton to the east.The area is mainly...
district of Leeds
Leeds
Leeds is a city and metropolitan borough in West Yorkshire, England. In 2001 Leeds' main urban subdivision had a population of 443,247, while the entire city has a population of 798,800 , making it the 30th-most populous city in the European Union.Leeds is the cultural, financial and commercial...
, West Yorkshire
West Yorkshire
West Yorkshire is a metropolitan county within the Yorkshire and the Humber region of England with a population of 2.2 million. West Yorkshire came into existence as a metropolitan county in 1974 after the passage of the Local Government Act 1972....
, England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
. At the age of 15, Heselden left Osmondthorpe
Osmondthorpe
Osmondthorpe is a district of east Leeds in West Yorkshire, England, although it is considered part of the Halton Moor district.It is situated in the LS9 Leeds postcode area, two miles to the east of Leeds city centre between East End Park and Halton Moor.At the edge of Osmondthorpe lies the...
Secondary Modern School
Secondary modern school
A secondary modern school is a type of secondary school that existed in most of the United Kingdom from 1944 until the early 1970s, under the Tripartite System, and was designed for the majority of pupils - those who do not achieve scores in the top 25% of the eleven plus examination...
to work as a labourer and then at collieries in Temple Newsam
Temple Newsam
Temple Newsam is a Tudor-Jacobean house with grounds landscaped by Capability Brown, in Leeds, West Yorkshire, England...
and Lofthouse
Lofthouse, West Yorkshire
Lofthouse is a village in West Yorkshire, England between the cities of Wakefield and Leeds. It is in the City of Leeds metropolitan borough but with a Wakefield postal address . It is mentioned as Locthuse also Loftose in the 1086 Domesday Book....
. He lost his job in the wave of redundancies that followed the 1984–85 miners' strike
UK miners' strike (1984–1985)
The UK miners' strike was a major industrial action affecting the British coal industry. It was a defining moment in British industrial relations, and its defeat significantly weakened the British trades union movement...
and spent his redundancy money
Layoff
Layoff , also called redundancy in the UK, is the temporary suspension or permanent termination of employment of an employee or a group of employees for business reasons, such as when certain positions are no longer necessary or when a business slow-down occurs...
on renting a workshop and, at first, setting up a sandblasting business. He then worked on developing and patenting a collapsible wire mesh and fabric container, now called Hesco bastion
Hesco bastion
The HESCO bastion is both a modern gabion used for flood control and military fortification and the name of the British company that developed it in the late 1980s. It is made of a collapsible wire mesh container and heavy duty fabric liner, and used as a temporary to semi-permanent dike or barrier...
, to be used for building flood management and to limit erosion.
Career
In 1989, Heselden founded Hesco Bastion Ltd to manufacture containers of the same name; filled with sand or earth, they quickly found favour with the armies of several countries, as they allowed effective blast walls, barriers and revetmentRevetment
Revetments, or revêtements , have a variety of meanings in architecture, engineering and art history. In stream restoration, river engineering or coastal management, they are sloping structures placed on banks or cliffs in such a way as to absorb the energy of incoming water...
s to be quickly constructed. Made in Hesco's factory in Leeds, these were shipped (flat-packed) in great numbers to conflict zones, including Kosovo
Kosovo War
The term Kosovo War or Kosovo conflict was two sequential, and at times parallel, armed conflicts in Kosovo province, then part of FR Yugoslav Republic of Serbia; from early 1998 to 1999, there was an armed conflict initiated by the ethnic Albanian "Kosovo Liberation Army" , who sought independence...
, Iraq and Afghanistan
War in Afghanistan (2001–present)
The War in Afghanistan began on October 7, 2001, as the armed forces of the United States of America, the United Kingdom, Australia, and the Afghan United Front launched Operation Enduring Freedom...
, as well as later being used for flood defences at New Orleans. He was appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the 2006 Queen's Birthday Honours
Queen's Birthday Honours
The Queen's Birthday Honours is a part of the British honours system, being a civic occasion on the celebration of the Queen's Official Birthday in which new members of most Commonwealth Realms honours are named. The awards are presented by the reigning monarch or head of state, currently Queen...
, "for services to the Defence industry and to Charity."
Philanthropy
In 2008, Heselden donated £1.5 million to the Help For HeroesHelp for Heroes
Help for Heroes is a British charity launched on 1 October 2007 to help provide better facilities for British servicemen and women wounded since September 11, 2001. It was founded by Bryn Parry OBE and his wife Emma Parry OBE after they visited soldiers at Selly Oak Hospital in Birmingham...
fund through a charity auction bid for nine people to fly with the Red Arrows
Red Arrows
The Red Arrows, officially known as the Royal Air Force Aerobatic Team, is the aerobatics display team of the Royal Air Force based at RAF Scampton, but due to move to RAF Waddington in 2011...
and, in the same year, set up the Hesco Bastion Fund in his home city with a £10 million donation to the Leeds Community Foundation. A further £3 million was added to the foundation in 2009 and an additional £10 million in 2010.
Death
At 11:40 a.m. on 26 September 2010, West Yorkshire PoliceWest Yorkshire Police
West Yorkshire Police is the territorial police force responsible for policing West Yorkshire in England. It is the fourth largest force in England and Wales by number of officers, with 5671 officers....
received reports of a man falling 80 feet (24.4 m) into the River Wharfe
River Wharfe
The River Wharfe is a river in Yorkshire, England. For much of its length it is the county boundary between West Yorkshire and North Yorkshire. The name Wharfe is Celtic and means "twisting, winding".The valley of the River Wharfe is known as Wharfedale...
, at the village of Thorp Arch near Boston Spa
Boston Spa
Boston Spa is a village and civil parish in the City of Leeds metropolitan borough in West Yorkshire, England, south of Wetherby, on the banks of the River Wharfe...
, apparently having fallen from the cliffs above. A Segway vehicle was recovered and Heselden was pronounced dead at the scene by paramedics. Investigators said, "At this time we do not believe the death to be suspicious" and were investigating as to "whether there was a fault with his particular machine or it was driver error".
On 4 October 2010, at an inquest at Leeds Coroner's Court, coroner David Hinchliff reported that a post-mortem examination had concluded that Heselden had suffered "multiple blunt force injuries of the chest and spine consistent with a fall whilst riding a gyrobike".
Recording a verdict of accidental death, West Yorkshire Coroner David Hinchliff told Mr Heselden's family: "I think it's probable - I think typical of Jimi and the type of man he was - he held back and waited as an act of courtesy to allow Mr Christie (a dog walker) more room.
In so doing, he's attempted to reverse the Segway back. As a result of that he's got into difficulty."
External links
- In Memoriam: Jimi Heselden OBE 1948-2010, HESCO website, 27 September 2010