Slingshot Ride Cable Snaps at Amusement Park in Florida

NTD Newsroom
By NTD Newsroom
August 21, 2019US News
share
Slingshot Ride Cable Snaps at Amusement Park in Florida
Carnival photo. (Osman Rana/Unsplash)

A couple of tourists were given the scare of a lifetime after getting on board a ride at a Florida amusement park.

Video captured by an on-looker at the Cobra Adventure Park in Panama City Beach shows two men seated in a slingshot-style ride waiting to be catapulted into the air by the ride’s operator.

Moments before the ride was set to initiate, the footage shows a cable snapping and fraying on the right side of the ride, reported FOX13.

Krissy Hurst of Havana, Florida—who recorded the video and posted it on Facebook—told reporters that she and a friend were visiting the amusement park on the night of the incident.

While they were at the park, the two ran into an acquaintance and his brother-in-law, who were visiting from California.

Hurst, who claims to have frequented the ride in the past, decided not to this time after having a bad feeling about it.

The ride, which according to WFTV9, is called the “Vertical Accelerator,” usually has a system in place to capture video of patrons, however after learning the video was not running, Hurst decided to record it herself.

As the cables are being tightened, a woman off-camera can be heard saying, “You’re gonna be screaming like sissies in about 10 seconds.”

After the cable snaps and frays, Hurst can be heard laughing and video shows the stunned reaction from the two men.

Soon after, the video cuts out and park attendants release the two men from the ride restraints.

Following the incident, Hurst mentioned that while the park did issue a refund, she didn’t “feel like anybody was really apologetic.”

Hurst went on to say she will never go on that ride again, and the men she recorded on the ride “are completely freaked out, still.”

Amusement Park Ride Collapses

Another case of an amusement park ride malfunctioning occurred earlier this year in the western Indian city of Ahmedabad on July 14.

The incident—killing two people and injuring 27 others—happened when the hammer shaped ride broke in half while carrying 30 people, reported New Delhi Television (NDTV).

“Twenty-nine people were brought to the hospital out of whom two died while twenty-seven are being treated,” Ahmedabad Mayor Bijal Patel told Ahmedabad Mirror, a local media.

According to the Press Trust of India, police identified those killed as a 24-year-old girl, Manali Rajwadi, and a 22-year-old man, Mohammad Javed.

“There are 32 seats in the ride that go round. The pipe of the main shaft broke and crashed on the ground. How that pipe broke is a matter of investigation by Forensic Science Laboratory (FSL),” Chief Fire Officer MF Dastoor told Indian wire services.

The accident happened just a few minutes after the ride left the ground at the Kankaria Adventure Park, according to Times Now News.

While police launched an investigation, 14 people were reported to be critically injured.

Venus Upadhayaya contributed to this report.