of RNZ<\/a><\/p>\nThe girls fell several metres from the ride at AgFest West Coast and hit another girl on the ground on Saturday afternoon.<\/p>\n
AgFest West Coast managing director Andy Thompson said it was unclear how far or why the girls fell, and WorkSafe had been notified.<\/p>\n
“I didn’t witness the incident myself, but it is fair to say more than two or three metres from what I can tell, and possibly more than that,” he said.<\/p>\n
Thompson said he had spoken to the mother of the girl who was hit on the ground, who said she was okay, but concerned for the teens.<\/p>\n
“The other two girls, I have not had a direct report yet from the authorities on their wellbeing but I understand their injuries were minor – still that is just very, very lucky that they weren’t injured any further,” he said.<\/p>\n
Thompson said everyone else was asked to get off the Ferris wheel. Operator Sturgeon Amusements shut down the ride and contacted the safety regulator.<\/p>\n
He said police took photos and secured the scene.<\/p>\n
The event ran from Friday to Saturday and was only 30 minutes from closing when the girls fell, Thompson said.<\/p>\n
“We’d had an incredibly successful day with over 10,000 people attending so it was a real shame that in the final few minutes an incident occurred. All the protocols and procedures we had in place, with the on-ground medical staff, police and communications with St John meant it was handled quickly and professionally.”<\/p>\n
Sturgeon Amusements has been contacted for comment.<\/p>\n
A WorkSafe spokesperson confirmed the regulator had been notified and inspectors were making enquiries to understand the circumstances of the fall.<\/p>\n
“An inspector has issued a prohibition notice while our enquiries are ongoing. This notice prevents use of the Ferris wheel while a competent person is engaged to assess the Ferris wheel and provide a report to the owner, Sturgeon Amusements Ltd, and WorkSafe,” the spokesperson said.<\/p>\n
Two men were injured after falling from a Ferris wheel operated by Event Hire at Rolling Meadows Festival in Christchurch on New Year’s Day.<\/p>\n
In August 2025 a part was seen to fall off a Ferris wheel operating at the Illuminate light show in Christchurch.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Two teenage girls are recovering from injuries suffered in a fall from a Ferris wheel at an agricultural…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":636616,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[1081,111,43,139,69,1241],"class_list":["post-636615","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-accident","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-west-coast"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/636615","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=636615"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/636615\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/636616"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=636615"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=636615"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=636615"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}