Kids left dangling upside down when ride gets stuck at Arkansas Fair, video shows

Children were left stuck and dangling upside down when an attraction suddenly froze mid-ride at the Arkansas State Fair, a mother says and video shows.

Allyson Metzger says her kids, 11 and 8, decided to go for a spin on the X-Drive ride during a recent visit to the fair, she said in an Oct. 13 Facebook post. But the ride suddenly and unexpectedly stopped moving, and Metzger could only watch while her kids sat trapped, upside down in the air.

“My kids were stuck upside down for at least 15 minutes and 7 workers couldn’t even get them down. How do you build rides and not know how to successfully remove people when it shuts down?!” she said in the post, sharing video of the incident. (McClatchy News is not sharing the video here because offensive language can be heard throughout.)

In the video, workers can be seen pushing against the stationary ride, apparently trying to make it spin.

“So I looked up (at my 11-year-old), and it looked like she had passed out,” Metzger told KATV. “I couldn’t see her. Her eyes were closed. She told me when she came home that she only remembered crying, and then, like, just kind of got dizzy, and her legs were hurting, I guess because the circulation was out.”

Workers were eventually able to get all passengers safely off the ride, but Metzger was shaken by the experience, according to her post.

“After what was spent to get in this place? RUN ME MY REFUND,” she said. “Shout out to the nice lady at the med tent who made sure my babies were ok and gave us our money back. I remember why I don’t come here.”

Scooter Korek, of North American Midway Entertainment, told KATV the ride stopped because a computer “received a fault,” triggering it to shut down — though it’s unclear what the fault was. He added that the ride is safe.

“Let me break it down to you in a nutshell: any of my family members can go on any of our rides any day. That’s how good I feel about our programs, our safety programs, and the people who work for us to operate and take care of these rides,” Korek told the station.

The Arkansas State Fair is held in Little Rock and runs from Oct. 11 to Oct. 20.

This story was originally published October 17, 2024 at 11:43 AM with the headline "Kids left dangling upside down when ride gets stuck at Arkansas Fair, video shows."