Last night a 14-year-old boy fell from the Orlando Free Fall ride at ICON Park. This attraction takes guests up 430 feet and drops them at 75 miles per hour. On the way down video shows the boy falling from the attraction.
Orange County Sheriff’s Office deputies responded at 11:12 PM. The boy was rushed to Orlando Health Arnold Palmer Hospital for Children where he was pronounced dead.
In a video on the Today show, the ride operator tells the riders that they are going to go up and drop. “You know how high you’re going? 430 feet. Coming down 75 miles per hour.”
A woman asks “Why doesn’t this have the little clicky click? Like the seatbelt?”
The ride operator responds with “The seatbelt? There ain’t any”
Then when they were going up the ride operator says “Have you checked your seatbelt? On the left side? Seatbelt!”
After the boy fell a crew member rushed to the boy while another one asked the ones that were seating guests if they checked them. Screaming “You guys are sure you checked him?”
The responded that they had.
John Stine, Slingshot Group Director of Sales and Marketing told Today:
“We operate the ride with all the safety precautions in mind.”
The Orlando Sentinel posted this comment from Stine:
“We are devastated that this happened, and our hearts go out the family. We are cooperating with all other investigations at this time to get to the bottom of what happened.”
The ride has been closed indefinitely while it is being investigated and the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services was on the scene this morning inspecting the attraction.
The ride has only been open since December.
This is so awful. I have kids and one of them is the same age. My heart breaks for the family and the witnesses of this accident.
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