Monday, March 27, 2000

By ALIYA SAPERSTEIN
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTER

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Jorge Turincio was making his second trip to Seattle in search of work. He came from San Diego for a two-week job that paid $18.45 an hour.

William "Billy Bob" Louth and several friends had taken jobs at the Kingdome after a slow summer at the Portland dry docks.

Turincio and Louth were getting ready to sandblast the Dome's ceiling late one night when the arm of their crane hit the roof and snapped.

Turincio and Louth, who were in the crane's bucket, fell 250 feet to their deaths. They were among five people who were injured inside the Kingdome and died.

On Oct. 15, 1981, the J. Geils Band was on stage warming up the crowd for the Rolling Stones. Pamela Lynn Melville and her friends were outside, sitting on a railing at the Kingdome's 200 level.

A Kingdome usher warned the group to get down from the concrete wall. Moments later, Melville, 16, of Renton, fell backward onto a ramp 50 to 75 feet below. She died in surgery that night at Harborview Medical Center.

On Dec. 4, 1981, William Brady Wales III, a Sealth High School senior, was watching the school's marching band compete in a state contest.

In a moment of excitement, he jumped onto a concrete railing between the 200 and 300 levels as he and his friends were leaving. He lost his balance and fell about 50 feet. Wales died the next morning.

On Nov. 20, 1982, Kim Steven Burke and three friends were running up a ramp to their 200-level seats for a Sonics-Cavaliers basketball game.

Burke had turned his head to look back at one of his friends when he ran into a steel pole -- part of a gate that had been left unlatched. The impact severely damaged his liver and Burke, 17, of Bremerton, died in surgery an hour later.

On Aug. 18, 1994, Turincio and Louth were working to repair moisture damage discovered after four tiles fell from the Dome's ceiling.

Miriam Turincio still remembers getting two phone calls that night.

From the first call, she learned there had been an accident. From the second, 10 minutes later, she learned her brother-in-law had died.

The day before the accident, it had been Jorge's voice on the telephone.

"It was my husband's birthday. He'd just had a stroke, but he was doing OK," Miriam Turincio said. "(Jorge) called to check on him and said, 'You know what, brother, I'll see you this weekend.' "

But the Turincios aren't happy to see the Kingdome come down. Jorge had played baseball since he was 6 -- including a stint as a left-handed pitcher in a league in Tijuana. He always said he wanted his body to be walked around a stadium after he died.

"It's going to be sad," Miriam Turincio said. "He died where he wanted to."