Jimi Heselden profile

Jimi Heselden,

James William "Jimi" Heselden OBE (1948 – 26 September 2010) was a British entrepreneur. A former coal miner, Heselden made his fortune manufacturing the Hesco bastion barrier system. In 2010 he bought Segway Inc., maker of the Segway personal transport system.Heselden was killed in 2010 from injuries apparently sustained falling from a cliff whilst riding a Segway. His fortune was estimated at £166 million and he was ranked 395th in the Sunday Times Rich List.

Early life

Heselden grew up in the Halton Moor district of Leeds, West Yorkshire, England.Aged 15, Heselden left school to work at collieries in Temple Newsam and Lofthouse.He lost his job in the wave of redundancies that followed the 1984-5 miners' strike and spent his redundancy money developing and patenting a collapsible wire mesh and fabric container, now called Hesco bastion, to be used for building flood management and to limit erosion.

Career

In 1989 Heselden founded Hesco Bastion Ltd. to manufacture these; filled with sand or earth they quickly found favour with the armies of several countries, as they allowed effective blast walls, barriers and revetments to be quickly constructed. Made in Hesco's factory in Leeds, these were shipped (flat-packed) in great numbers to conflict zones including Kosovo, Iraq and Afghanistan. He was appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the 2006 Queen's Birthday Honours, "for services to the Defence Industry and to Charity."

Philanthropy

In 2008 Heselden donated £1.5 million to the Help For Heroes fund through a charity auction bid for nine people to fly with the Red Arrows.and in the same year set up the Leeds Community Foundation in his home city with a £10 million donation. A further £3 million was added to the foundation in 2009 and an additional £10 million in 2010. Until recently, he had been particularly reticent about his charity work.

“ There are people out there who are making money and when times are good I honestly believe people have a moral obligation to use their wealth to help others. ”

—Jimi Heselden

Death

At 11:40 a.m. on 26 September 2010, West Yorkshire Police received reports of a man falling 30 feet into the River Wharfe, at the village of Thorp Arch near Boston Spa, apparently having fallen from the cliffs above. A Segway vehicle was recovered and Heselden was pronounced dead at the scene by paramedics. Investigators said "at this time we do not believe the death to be suspicious" and were investigating as to "whether there was a fault with his particular machine or it was driver error".

(source:wikipedia)