{"id":307942,"date":"2026-10-16T13:10:15","date_gmt":"2026-10-16T13:10:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/307942\/"},"modified":"2026-10-16T13:10:15","modified_gmt":"2026-10-16T13:10:15","slug":"runaway-inflatable-pumpkins-prompt-urge-to-batten-down-halloween-decorations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/307942\/","title":{"rendered":"Runaway inflatable pumpkins prompt urge to batten down Halloween decorations"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao MvWXB TjIXL aGjvy ebVHC \">Officials are urging you to batten down those Halloween decorations, as some runaway pumpkins gave people quite a scare.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">Call it the Great Pumpkin escape.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">A two-story-high inflatable jack-o&#8217;-lantern took a tumble through Cary, North Carolina, Sunday, just as the remnants of Hurricane Isaias passed through. And social media loved it.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">\u201cIt\u2019s the best advertising we could ask for,\u201d Michael Phillips, owner of Phillips Farm, said of his bright orange fugitive.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">With a tornado warning in effect Sunday afternoon, workers had decided to forgo blowing up the oversized lawn ornament. Sure enough, a twister reportedly touched down about a quarter mile (.40 kilometers) away.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">But when the sun peeked out, Michael\u2019s dad Lee Phillips decided to pump up the pumpkin, complete with its classic black triangular eyes and a lopsided grin.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">\u201cAll of a sudden, we started getting like 35-, 40-mile-an-hour (56-64 kilometer) wind gusts out of nowhere,\u201d Michael Phillips said. \u201cAnd then, `Bam.\u2019 It just started going.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">The giant pumpkin took flight, rolling along a post-and-rail fence, past a church and on down the road.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">\u201cIt just went crazy,\u201d Michael Phillips said of the online reaction. \u201cI still wake up every morning &#8230; and have 80 to 150 notifications of people commenting on the videos.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">Some wags have turned the footage into a meme, pretending it\u2019s some kind of alien creature coming to destroy the city. Phillips said his workers had the situation under control in about a minute, and no one was ever in any danger.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">But with six weeks of hurricane season left, he\u2019s not taking any chances. The wayward squash is now secured with paracord, baling twine and corkscrew spikes, with everything tied off to two tractors.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">&#8220;Unless the tractors fly away, it\u2019s not going anywhere,\u201d Michael Phillips said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">A giant inflatable pumpkin also bounced off parked cars in Iowa, sending one driver swerving.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Call it the Great Pumpkin escape.\" class=\"hsDdd NDJZt sJeUN IJwXl vBqtr KrDt itslR zFTjo hakZw HlUVI \" data-testid=\"prism-image\" draggable=\"false\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/19943341_101626-wpvi-runaway-pumpkins-530a-vo-video-C-vid.jpg\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Call it the Great Pumpkin escape.<\/p>\n<p>Copyright \u00a9 2026 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Officials are urging you to batten down those Halloween decorations, as some runaway pumpkins gave people quite a&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":307943,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[126250,69,71,70],"class_list":["post-307942","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-philadelphia","tag-126250","tag-philadelphia","tag-philadelphia-headlines","tag-philadelphia-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307942","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=307942"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307942\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/307943"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=307942"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=307942"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=307942"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}