Two teenagers have been charged after authorities said they deliberately caused a swing ride to spin dangerously out of control, injuring three people.
The 13-year-olds had reportedly been warned not to fasten their seats together while the ride was operating at the Columbia County Fall Fair in Georgia on Saturday, a sheriff’s department spokesperson told WRDW.
Video from the scene shows the ride moving normally before becoming increasingly unstable as it slowed. Riders can be heard screaming as the swings appeared to slam into one another.
One woman’s swing then appeared to detach from the ride, throwing her into the air.
Kristen Murphy, the mother who recorded the incident, dropped her phone after seeing the woman launched from the ride. She said the chairs were “violently hitting the riders, the passengers [and] other chairs.”
“My husband even told me—he was several hundred feet behind me at the other ride with my other two kids—that from his perspective, being far back, it looked like pure chaos. It looked like the ride was going to fly apart,” she recalled.
Officials said one woman was hurt and taken from the fairgrounds by ambulance. Two children were treated at the scene for minor injuries.
The unidentified teenagers were issued citations for unruly behavior and allowed to leave the fair with their parents, according to Local 12 News.
Two 13-year-olds face charges after authorities said they caused a swing ride to become unstable at Saturday’s Columbia County Fall Fair in Georgia
Video appeared to show a woman’s swing breaking away from the ride and sending her into the air
Murphy, whose teenagers were riding when the incident occurred, told WRDW that she ran toward them while the ride was still moving.
“This ride has to stop. My kids are on it. Something’s happening. I need to get to them,” she remembered saying.
Several other parents rushed to the control panel and helped her husband bring the ride to a halt. Once it stopped, Murphy said, she saw that some riders had suffered “pretty severe injuries.”
Murphy also said she saw little urgency from law enforcement or emergency medical personnel and claimed that no representative from the Merchants Association took a statement from her family.
The experience has left her questioning whether she will ever attend another fair.
“I was already apprehensive about it to begin with, because these rides are taken up and down all the time. Your kids want to go, you let them talk you into it—and then the next thing you know, this is what happens.”
Our News Outlet has contacted the Merchants Association of Columbia County, which organizes the annual fair, and the Columbia County Sheriff’s Office for comment.
The incident occurred less than a month after Hassan Kariem, 42, died in a freak accident aboard the Goliath roller coaster at Six Flags Over Georgia in Austell, roughly two and a half hours away.
Hassan Kariem, 42, died in a freak accident aboard The Goliath roller coaster at Six Flags Over Georgia on October 12
Six Flags’ CEO said seatbelts would be added to several rides after Kariem’s death. Riders are shown being evacuated from the coaster following the accident
The teacher was recorded being thrown from his seat in front of horrified passengers, including members of his family.
John Reilly, CEO of Six Flags Entertainment Corporation, later said seatbelts would be installed on Goliath. The coaster has remained closed since the fatal incident.
“We are reinforcing safety precautions at our parks and taking additional measures, including adding seat belts on Goliath and other coasters with a similar restraint,” Reilly said.
Reilly said the park’s ride operators undergo a multistage training program involving “classroom instruction, hands-on training, and supervised, on-the-job experience,” along with further instruction and evaluations when needed.
Robert Niles, editor of ThemeParkInsider.com, told WSB-TV that some rides do not use seatbelts because eliminating them can help reduce rider wait times.
“That seat belt is an added layer. Until now, all the evidence suggested that the clamshell restraint was sufficient, meaning an additional lap belt was unnecessary. Adding one would take another moment or two to connect and disconnect at the end of the ride,” Niles said.
“But given what has happened, that calculation may change for many theme parks.”
