One dies after shortened Chicago Marathon

CHICAGO -- A Michigan police officer died Sunday while running the Chicago Marathon as stifling heat and smothering humidity forced race organizers to shut down the course midway through the event, authorities said.

Chad Schieber, 35, collapsed while running on the city's South Side and was pronounced dead shortly before 1 p.m. at a Veteran's Affairs hospital, according to the Cook County Medical Examiner's office.

An autopsy on the Midland, Mich. man was scheduled for today.

"Obviously very sad news, and our thoughts and prayers are with the individual's family," said Shawn Platt, senior vice president of LaSalle Bank, the marathon's sponsor.

George Chiampas, the race's medical director, said witnesses reported seeing Schieber collapse and become unresponsive.

"It sounds like he lost his pulse very fast and died on the race course," Chiampas said at a news conference after the race.

Schieber was a 12-year police veteran in Midland, a city of about 42,000 in central Lower Michigan. He worked as a field training officer, community relations officer and implemented the department's child DNA identification program, the Midland Daily News reported.

By 10 a.m., temperatures had already reached a race-record of 88 degrees. The previous marathon record of 84 degrees was set in 1979.

At least 49 people were taken to hospitals, while another 250 were treated on-site, many for heat-related ailments. Chicago Fire Department officials said they used 30 ambulances from area suburbs.

About 10,000 of the 45,000 registered runners never even showed up for the 30th annual race, while another 10,934 started but didn't finish, officials said.

The high heat index prompted organizers to stop the race at 11:30 a.m., about 3 1/2 hours into the run. Runners who hadn't reached the halfway point were diverted to the start and finish area, while those on the second half of the course were advised to drop out, walk or board cooling buses, Platt said.

He and other organizers acknowledged that not all runners heeded the warnings, and many continued.

Race director Carey Pinkowski said organizers were concerned that emergency medical personnel wouldn't be able to keep up with heat-related injuries as the weather turned more cruel.

"We were seeing a high rate of people that were struggling," Pinkowski said. "If you were out there at 1 o'clock, it was a hot sun. It was like a summer day, it was just a brutally hot day."

Pinkowski said it was a tough decision to stop the race, but a prudent one.

Lori Kaufman, a runner from St. Louis, said she was told to start walking at mile 14. She said the fire department turned on hydrants to hose people down along the course. She also said she didn't have enough water and Gatorade.

"We had a lot of spectators just handing us bottles of water which helped a lot," Kaufman said. "Every medic station that we passed was full of people. I mean they were not doing well."

Paul Gardiner, a runner from England, said the weather made for a "brutal" run.

"We were at about 18 miles and we heard they canceled it and that kind of sent a little bit of concern through the crowd," Gardiner said. "It's just it's impossible to run."

Marathon officials lined the 26.2 mile race route with cooling buses, misters and water-soaked sponges and promised to beef up water supplies at aid stations.

But that didn't appear to be enough as runners reported shortages of water and Gatorade along the course. Pinkowski said he was confident there were enough fluids at the race's 15 aid stations and race officials said they added 205,000 water servings to the course.

"We increased all those areas, added ice, were talking to our volunteer coordinators, at no point did we not have fluids," Pinkowski said. But he added that the race would "go back and take a real hard look at it."

The decision to end the race early was one of many unusual moments Sunday that began when Kenyan Patrick Ivuti won the muggy marathon in the closest finish in race history, edging Jaouad Gharib.

In the women's race, Ethiopian Berhane Adere rallied with a come-from-behind final sprint to defend her title.

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On the Net:

www.chicagomarathon.com

Associated Press freelancer Benjamin Sylvan contributed to this report.