A Tough Mudder event in April 2012 in Pennsylvania. (Shutterstock/Glynnis Jones)

A man from Ellicott City, Md. was pronounced dead at a Northern Virginia hospital last weekend after an accident he sustained while participating in an obstacle course race in West Virginia. Avishek Sengupta was competing in a “Tough Mudder” event, a 10- to 12-mile race that distinguishes itself by including obstacles such as sheets of fire, climbing walls, and scrambles through water.

In Sengupta’s case, he injured himself while jumping off a plank and into a mud pit, The Baltimore Sun reports:

Sengupta, 28, was with a half-dozen friends on the course Saturday when he encountered the “Walk the Plank” obstacle, in which participants jump into a deep pool of muddy water 15 feet below a wooden platform. Sengupta jumped in but did not resurface and was later flown to Inova Fairfax Hospital in Falls Church, Va., where he was taken off life support Sunday.

The company that organizes the Tough Mudder races, which take place at various locations around the world, says the obstacles are similar to those used by the British military in training its special forces. The event last weekend, in Gerrardstown, W.Va., attracted 14,000 competitors, including Baltimore Ravens head coach John Harbaugh.

In a statement, Tough Mudder LLC says Sengupta’s death is the first in the three-year history of the race series, which has attracted 750,000 participants since its inception. ““As organizers, we take our responsibility to provide a safe event to our participants very seriously,” Will Dean, the company’s CEO, says in a prepared statement.

The company also its obstacles are “designed by trained engineers” and checked over by safety inspectors. Tough Mudder also says 75 emergency personnel were on-site during last Saturday’s event.

Here’s what Tough Mudder advertised in luring those 14,000 people out to Gerrardstown: