{"id":314022,"date":"2026-05-29T14:11:25","date_gmt":"2026-05-29T14:11:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/314022\/"},"modified":"2026-05-29T14:11:25","modified_gmt":"2026-05-29T14:11:25","slug":"students-saved-from-texas-pleasure-pier-roller-coaster","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/314022\/","title":{"rendered":"Students saved from Texas&#8217; Pleasure Pier roller coaster"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Eight students were stranded on a roller coaster dangling 100 feet in the air for four hours before they were rescued by firefighters.<\/p>\n<p>The Iron Shark roller coaster of Galveston, Texas\u2019 Pleasure Pier <a href=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/2026\/05\/21\/lifestyle\/amusement-park-accidents-seem-more-frequent-should-fans-run-away-scared-as-thrill-rides-are-pushed-to-the-limit\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">malfunctioned on Thursday<\/a> evening, leaving the group of students from Houston facing straight up just before the peak of the ride\u2019s famous 100-foot drop.<\/p>\n<p>The pier was evacuated and firefighters extended a massive ladder and carefully brought down the students one by one in a harness, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.khou.com\/article\/news\/local\/live-now-riders-stuck-on-galveston-rollercoaster\/285-e4198cc8-5a1a-460e-826e-cce9a996a516\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">KHOU reported<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><img style=\"aspect-ratio:1.50146628;display:block\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-modal-image=\"39522754\" width=\"886\" height=\"590\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/8-students-rescued-roller-coaster-129062656_3eac13.jpg\" alt=\"The eight students were meticulously rescued one at a time.\" class=\"wp-image-39522754\"  \/>The eight students were meticulously rescued one at a time. ABC13<\/p>\n<p>They were all safely on the ground around 8:30 p.m. \u2014 roughly four hours after they had gotten stuck.<\/p>\n<p>Galveston Fire Chief Mike Varela said the students were rattled by the experience, but were otherwise doing well.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cOf course they were shaken up from climbing that ladder down, being in that hot sun,\u201d he said. \u201cThey have been checked for dehydration and everyone seems to be doing pretty good.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The eight riders were all students from Houston Independent School District on a field trip organized by two charter schools, Energized for STEM Academy Middle School and STEM Academy High School, <a href=\"https:\/\/abc13.com\/post\/galveston-pleasure-pier-roller-coaster-stopped-rider-rescue-underway-skyeye13-shows\/19189544\/?ex_cid=TA_KTRK_TW&amp;taid=6a1963bd4b8aea00012d6e8f&amp;utm_campaign=trueAnthem%3A+Trending+Content&amp;utm_medium=trueAnthem&amp;utm_source=twitter\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">ABC 13 reported<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe are grateful that all students, staff, and chaperones are safe. School administration is in direct contact with the families of all students who were on the trip,\u201d the district said in a statement.\u00a0\u201cWe are thankful for the rescue efforts of the first responders and park personnel.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Terry Turney, chief operating officer of Pleasure Pier, confirmed that an unknown issue triggered the emergency stop.<\/p>\n<p><img style=\"aspect-ratio:1.77777778;display:block\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-modal-image=\"39522750\" width=\"1024\" height=\"576\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/8-students-rescued-roller-coaster-129062938_46b7d4.jpg\" alt=\"The ride malfunctioned by the students were 100 feet in the air.\" class=\"wp-image-39522750\"  \/>The ride malfunctioned while the students were 100 feet in the air. KHOU 11<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe ride experienced a malfunction at its initial ascent, however, as designed, it immediately stopped to keep everyone safe,\u201d Turney said in a statement.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cA thorough inspection of the ride will take place before it is placed back in service,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Eight students were stranded on a roller coaster dangling 100 feet in the air for four hours before&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":314023,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[8370,9983,5033,27,29,28,734],"class_list":["post-314022","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-texas","tag-amusement-parks","tag-rescues","tag-roller-coasters","tag-texas","tag-texas-headlines","tag-texas-news","tag-us-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/314022","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=314022"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/314022\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/314023"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=314022"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=314022"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=314022"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}