On February 6th, 2020 a man fell into the LEGO City River at exactly 8:24am. What should have been a coordinated and organized rescue attempt turned into a three week protest and the entire city government shutting down for four days.

Ole Kirkbi, a danish tourist visiting LEGO City, was enjoying an early morning by standing next to the LEGO City River that zig-zags across the city. However, as he was leaning on the railing, it gave away and he soon fell into the river. 

It didn’t take long for people to notice and soon emergency services were contacted and a helicopter was to swoop in to heroically save Kirkbi. But to quote one engineer, “Hey!” as security footage shows the man run towards a supervisor: “We need to build the rescue helicopter […] and then save the man from the LEGO City River.” The situation was plagued by mechanical failures and lack of funding for LEGO City’s emergency services. Last year, the city government slashed funding for emergency services by over 50%. Leading to most rescue vehicles being sold or in disrepair. 

When the helicopter finally started to head towards Kirkbi, it was 16 minutes after he had fallen into the river and the LCPD along with the Coast Guard had to block off sections of the harbor so that ships wouldn’t interfere with the rescue. They even had rescue boats out to try and find Kirbi but to no avail. 

When the helicopter finally reached Kirkbi, everybody thought the crisis was over. That everyone who was involved in the rescue would get a pat on the back. But that didn’t happen, Kirkbi later came out and stated that “they were incredibly harsh with me […] it was like I was a liability to them. It hurt me more than the shock from falling into that river.” Kirkbi later would file a lawsuit against the city government for medical mistreatment and protests for Kirkbi later rose up earlier last week. 

“SAY NO FOR MAYOR MCGREG!” reads one sign at a rally, people with megaphones giving passionate speeches, and riot police nearby to maintain order if so needs be. It so just happened to be the election for City Mayor and with this chaos, McGreg is sure to lose re-election. He did give a speech days after the incident to promise that he will “Do everything in my power to investigate the mishandling of a visitor to our great city.”

Weeks passed and almost nothing is known about the incident other than the two men who dragged Kirkbi into the helicopter have been fired. The LEGO City General Hospital has not disclosed any information and Kirkbi has not commented on any interviews so far about the incident. The lack of intelligence on the situation has caused bigger protests in LEGO City recently and McGreg is being investigated for corruption and money laundering by the FBI. 

All we can do now is to see where the lawsuit goes. There’s a storm brewing that might rip LEGO City apart.

UPDATE: Kirkbi has dropped their lawsuit on the city government but stability has remained an all-time low. McGreg has been charged with multiple accounts of misusing city funds for personal needs. The Advocate will keep up with this story 24/7.