19-year-old injured in fall trying to sneak into bar

An underage man denied entry to a Manayunk bar Thursday night tried to sneak in by climbing up a back deck bordering the Schuylkill, but fell more than 15 feet and injured himself, officials say.

Initial reports had indicated that he was a patron who fell from a deck at the bar into the river, but police and fire officials said that was not the case.

Officer Jillian Russell, a police spokeswoman, said the 19-year-old man had tried to get into the Mad River Bar and Grille on Main Street sometime after 11:30 p.m. but was denied entry.

He then went around to the back of the bar, where he tried to climb a wall to the deck on the riverbank and fell 15 to 20 feet, police and fire officials said.

The Fire Department had dispatched a water rescue team, uncertain whether the man gone into the river, but firefighters found he had not when they arrived.

The man, whose name has not been released, was taken to Albert Einstein Medical Center, where he was being treated for nonlife-threatening injuries to an ankle and his chest.