PHOENIX — A woman reportedly hit in the face by a piece of cement at Chase Field is calling for the Arizona Diamondbacks to ensure the stadium is safe for fans in the stands.
Megan Herring, 25, and her family attended a baseball game at the downtown Phoenix stadium in June 2022.
They were seated in Section 130, along third base, under the overhang for the upper deck.
While waiting for the first pitch, Herring said a hard object "hit me straight on my face."
"I'm holding my face and just crying because it was so painful," said Herring.
She says her husband was hit on the leg by the same object.
When the Herrings looked down, they say they found a chunk of cement on the ground which was the size of a person's hand. Herring said it came from the underside of the upper deck.
"There's that cement that makes up the stairs, and it was it had just detached from there," she said.
Herring showed ABC15 photos of her bruised and swollen face and the injury to her eye.
Two other spectators say they saw something fall straight down before it hit Herring. She went to the emergency room the day of the accident and later to an eye specialist.
"When you are told there's blood near your eye, that's terrifying," she said.
Megan says she recently received an insurance settlement from the D-backs.
Chase Field staff created an incident report about the falling rock, but now a spokesperson tells ABC15 they dispute Herring's story.
"We have found no direct correlation or confirmation of loose concrete being involved," a team spokesperson said in an email. "No structural integrity issues have been identified that would compromise the safety of our fans."
The team provided no other explanation and declined an interview with ABC15.
"We just want to have it so other people don't get hurt, too," added Herring. "That's our biggest thing."
"We've been seeing reports and articles of the condition of that stadium, dating all the way back to 2017, of how bad it has been," said Herring's husband, Matthew.
In 2017, the D-backs, which lease the ballpark, sued Maricopa County, which owns the facility, over repair costs. The lawsuit said water seeping at Chase Field has led to rusting of metal plates and rebar and, over time, can cause delamination, cracking, and spalling of the concrete. Both sides settled, and millions of dollars of concrete repair was completed.
D-backs Managing Partner Ken Kendrick and President and CEO Derrick Hall talked about the condition of the 25-year-old stadium in February.
"We have had issues with the ballpark," said Hall during a spring training media availability. "We've been able to repair what we need to for the most part."
They didn't talk specifically about concrete.
Much of their focus was on the retractable roof, which is no longer opened or closed when fans are inside the stadium due to safety concerns.
The roof is not watertight. The rain came pouring in at the World Baseball Classic in March.
The D-backs' lease at Chase Field is almost over. They say they will decide later this year if the team will stay at the downtown Phoenix ballpark, and if so, they promise to invest hundreds of millions of dollars in repairs and upgrades.
"We feel our fans deserve that," said Kendrick.
Herring says fans deserve quicker action to prevent another accident like hers.
"No structure that has concrete falling from it is safe for people to be in," she said. "Putting it off isn't going to be a good enough answer when it hits more people."
