'It's 'OK! It's OK to let go, I'll catch you, honey. I'm not going to let you fall!"

[Snowboarder_Bo]

[:eek:

Wow!

Matthew Howard Sr. was just leaving a New York amusement park Saturday evening when he heard someone screaming.

He looked up to see a young girl dangling about 25 feet (about 8 meters) off the ground from a slow-moving gondola ride. Her little brother sat next to her in the green two-person pod, crying hysterically for help, saying he couldn’t hold on.

Howard, 47, and his 21-year-old daughter, Leeann Winchell, positioned themselves under the girl as the ride stopped and security came running. A crowd of onlookers gathered, many filming, others calling for help.

“I said: 'It’s ‘OK! It’s OK to let go, I’ll catch you, honey. I’m not going to let you fall,’” said Howard.

The girl lost her grip and fell down where Howard and Winchell, and others, were waiting. The two took the brunt of the girl’s fall, tumbling to the ground themselves the catch. The two and some other good Samaritans carried to her to where emergency workers later arrived to help her.

](http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_AMUSEMENT_PARK_FALL_NYOL-?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2017-06-25-14-47-31)Dramatic video taken by park visitor Loren Lent on Facebook.

HUGE kudos to Mr. Howard and Miss Winchell and everyone else involved in this effort! This is truly an example of what is best in humanity.

[Patx2]

I just saw this not too long ago, it’s a great story and thank goodness they were there and thought quickly enough to prevent what could’ve been a tragic accident. My hat is off to them, well done!

[Rilchiam]

Eh, I don’t know. I keep hearing that this happened because she was trying to touch the trees with her feet and that’s how she slid out. Sad fact is, almost always when someone gets hurt/in a predicament at an amusement park, it’s their own dumb fault.

[Melbourne]

@Rilchiam

Eh, I don’t know. I keep hearing that this happened because she was trying to touch the trees with her feet and that’s how she slid out. Sad fact is, almost always when someone gets hurt/in a predicament at an amusement park, it’s their own dumb fault.

Not in aus. Either your people are dumber, or our equipment in worse shape.

In any case though, if an accident happened because a kid slipped out, that’s an accident waiting to happen, and indicates a design or procedural error as well as a cuustomer fault.

[cochrane]

@Rilchiam

Eh, I don’t know. I keep hearing that this happened because she was trying to touch the trees with her feet and that’s how she slid out. Sad fact is, almost always when someone gets hurt/in a predicament at an amusement park, it’s their own dumb fault.

So, they should have just let her fall and hit the ground, then? It would have served her right. It was her own dumb fault. :rolleyes:

[Rilchiam]

@cochrane

So, they should have just let her fall and hit the ground, then? It would have served her right. It was her own dumb fault. :rolleyes:

Certainly not. But it happened because she was fooling around, so she owes double the thanks to her rescuers that she would if it had happened randomly. Especially to the guy who hurt his back catching her.

Originally posted by Melbourne Not in aus. Either your people are dumber, or our equipment in worse shape.

Probably both. I’ll amend “almost always” to “a lot of times”, but looking at Disneyland accidents just for starters (and I know this was Six Flags, not Disney), I see people who stood up on a ride, got out of the car, took off their safety belts, tried to swim back from Tom Sawyer Island, and one guy who purposely jumped out of a gondola. And yes, some accidents were the result of ride malfunction or staff error, but not all.

Ride operators always tell guests “Keep your hands and feet inside the car/gondola/whatever at all times.” Meaning, they shouldn’t have to be responsible for people who go outside the parameters of the way the ride was designed.

[muldoonthief]

@Rilchiam

Certainly not. But it happened because she was fooling around, so she owes double the thanks to her rescuers that she would if it had happened randomly. Especially to the guy who hurt his back catching her.

Probably both. I’ll amend “almost always” to “a lot of times”, but looking at Disneyland accidents just for starters (and I know this was Six Flags, not Disney), I see people who stood up on a ride, got out of the car, took off their safety belts, tried to swim back from Tom Sawyer Island, and one guy who purposely jumped out of a gondola. And yes, some accidents were the result of ride malfunction or staff error, but not all.

Ride operators always tell guests “Keep your hands and feet inside the car/gondola/whatever at all times.” Meaning, they shouldn’t have to be responsible for people who go outside the parameters of the way the ride was designed.

Yeah, from your own cite, “a lot of times” is actually “less than half”, especially if you consider number of injuries instead of number of incidents. Things like derailings, collisions, and the like. But please, do go on feeling smug and self righteous about it.

[voltaire]

Youtube video for the Facebookless.

[BigT]

If the kid can slip out just trying to reach the trees with her feet, then I would argue that is a safety hazard. They should be secured well enough that this can’t happen.

Unless you are alleging she unhooked the safety measures (a belt, I’m assuming). But I would argue that this should not be easy to do on a kids’ ride. I don’t remember that being an option on the rides I used to go on as a kid.

[Mama_Zappa]

@BigT

If the kid can slip out just trying to reach the trees with her feet, then I would argue that is a safety hazard. They should be secured well enough that this can’t happen.

Unless you are alleging she unhooked the safety measures (a belt, I’m assuming). But I would argue that this should not be easy to do on a kids’ ride. I don’t remember that being an option on the rides I used to go on as a kid.

That ride looks identical to the one at HersheyPark, that I’ve ridden since I was younger than the kids in the video, and yeah, there are design issues with that sort - the cars don’t really stop, you have to hop on them and the attendant lowers a bar over you while the thing is still moving. No belt, no latch. It honestly never occurred to me before that it would be that easy to slip out of but seeing the video, I wonder there haven’t been more injuries!