A young teen from Missouri tragically lost his life during a recent visit to ICON Park in Orlando, Florida. Tyre Sampson was visiting the amusement park with a friend’s family, and he rode the Orlando Free Fall ride, which barely opened this past December.
The 430-foot attraction is “the world’s tallest free-standing drop tower,” and it slowly ferries parkgoers to the top before tilting 30 degrees forward and “free-falling nearly 400 feet at speeds reaching over 75 mph.” Riders are secured by only an over-the-shoulder harness that is not accompanied by a seat belt.
Sampson was on the ride late Thursday evening, and everything was going smoothly during the ride’s slow ascent and swift descent. However, as the tall ride suddenly began to slow down toward the lower end, Sampson flew out of his seat and hit the pavement below. He later died of his injuries at a nearby hospital.
“Based on all of our preliminary investigation and information, it appears to be a terrible tragedy—but our investigation is still open,” Orange County Sheriff John Mina said. “All other aspects of the investigation, as far as the ride itself and safety of the ride, that’s investigated by the [Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Affairs.]”
Jarringly, the entire ordeal was caught on camera, and the video soon began circulating on Twitter. The video containes graphic content and may be upsetting to some people.
“At first, we thought it was a piece of the ride or whatever until we got a little closer and it was a person laying on the ground,” Montrey Williams, an eyewitness, recalled. “Everyone was just panicking and screaming.”
Brian Avery, a University of Florida lecturer and independent ride safety consultant said that current information on the tragedy makes it difficult to tell what the exact cause could’ve been.
“It could be a multitude of issues, either operator failure in some capacity, it could be a patron-related failure in some capacity, it could be a manufacturer defect [or] it could be a maintenance issue,” he said. “It will take some time to unpack through a series of investigations.”
We are back out at the Free Fall ride at ICON Park. It looks like state inspectors are here now looking over the ride. This is the ride that a 14 y/o boy died on last night after he apparently fell out of his seat mid-ride. pic.twitter.com/2APPim8O7l
— Kelsi Thorud (@KelsiThorud) March 25, 2022
Further investigation into the matter is currently underway by the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Affairs, and “absolutely no criminal charges” have been filed.
