People pass out at water parks and feel sick on thrill rides in Orlando, state report says

Universal Volcano Bay
The new state theme park injury report was released Wednesday.

A 25-year-old woman hit her head on a Disney World water slide and passed out, while a 23-year-old lost consciousness at Universal’s Volcano Bay water park. Other people in their 60s and 70s reported feeling ill after riding fast-moving thrill rides at Orlando’s theme parks.

These are the incidents emerging out of a new state report that discloses health emergencies this Spring at Florida’s biggest theme parks.

Every year, millions of people visit Disney World, Universal Orlando and the other major parks. The parks are required to self-report the most serious incidents when their guests were sick or hurt on a ride and were hospitalized for at least 24 hours.

The new state report covering April through June discloses the incidents with limited information, so it’s hard to know exactly what happened or how serious the incident was.

The 25-year-old passed out at Humunga Kowabunga which Disney calls “the fastest, steepest waterslide” at Disney’s Typhoon Lagoon water park. The 23-year-old woman’s incident occurred on the raft ride Honu of the Honu ika Moana at Volcano Bay.

Several incidents happened at the Magic Kingdom, which is the world’s busiest theme park. A 60-year-old man felt chest pain after riding Buzz Lightyear’s Space Ranger Spin, a dark ride interactive shooting game, and a 76-year-old man felt faint after riding the new Tron Lightcycle Run roller coaster.

At Universal, a 70-year-old man felt chest pressure on the TeAwa The Fearless River whitewater ride at Volcano Bay, while an 8-year-old boy had leg pain at the Runamukka Reef play area at the water park.

A 78-year-old man felt dizzy and passed out on the Harry Potter and the Forbidden Journey coaster at Universal Islands of Adventure. A 64-year-old woman felt dizzy on the Hogwarts Express train connecting the two Universal theme parks.

People reported feeling dizzy or back pain on the Hogwarts Express train connecting the two Universal theme parks.

In some cases, the parks said the guests had “pre-existing conditions” but did not provide more details.

SeaWorld Orlando, Busch Gardens Tampa Bay and Legoland did not report any medical emergencies.

Gabrielle Russon

Gabrielle Russon is an award-winning journalist based in Orlando. She covered the business of theme parks for the Orlando Sentinel. Her previous newspaper stops include the Sarasota Herald-Tribune, Toledo Blade, Kalamazoo Gazette and Elkhart Truth as well as an internship covering the nation’s capital for the Chicago Tribune. For fun, she runs marathons. She gets her training from chasing a toddler around. Contact her at [email protected] or on Twitter @GabrielleRusson .


One comment

  • My Take

    July 17, 2024 at 5:27 pm

    I wonder how they control that brain-eating amoeba in those big waterparks.

Comments are closed.


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