A theme park guest was hit by the ‘world’s longest steel inverted roller coaster’ in Ohio while apparently trying to retrieve his keys.
The 38-year-old man was struck by the Banshee ride at Kings Island around 8pm on Wednesday, according to park officials and Mason police.
A witness said he had hopped a fence to try to get his lost item, WXIX reported.
The coaster was traveling at its top speed of 68mph when it hit the man and caused him ‘traumatic injury’, early emergency dispatches indicated.
Emergency responders found the man critically injured in a restricted area, police said.
He was rushed to West Chester Hospital and airlifted to University of Cincinnati Medical Center.
Kings Island on Wednesday night stated that the man ‘entered a restricted, fenced area of the Banshee roller coaster and is believed to have been struck by the ride’.
The park stated that its ‘safety and first aid personnel responded immediately to the situation and contacted local emergency responders’ and that ‘Kings Island’s focus continues to be on the welfare of the guest and his family’.
It is closed amid an investigation into the incident.
The man’s identity and an update on his condition were not released by authorities as of early Thursday.
Banshee is 4,124 feet long and ties another steel inverted coaster for record length, according to the park’s website.
‘Themed to a wailing mythological messenger from the underworld with flowing white hair and gleaming eyes, Banshee features the following succession of breath-taking thrills,’ states the site.
‘A 167-foot lift hill, 150-foot curved first drop, a dive loop, a vertical loop encircling the lift hill, a zero-gravity roll, a pair of batwing inversions, outside loop, spiral, in-line roll and carousel, all at speeds up to 68 mph!’
It reaches top speed midway through the course instead of at the first drop like the majority of coasters.
State Department of Agriculture officials went to the site on Thursday ‘to conduct a full re-inspection of the ride and an investigation to ensure the ride was operating in accordance with Ohio’s law and rules’, the agency’s spokeswoman, Meghan Harshbarger, told WXIX.
The man was struck 10 months after a teenage girl standing near a roller coaster at Dutch Wonderland in Pennsylvania was hit in the head by a ‘box cutter type device’ that fell out of a rider’s pocket.
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