Video shows the moment a 6-year-old boy fell 40 feet from a zip line in Mexico — and survived
A family's trip to an amusement park in Mexico turned into a near-disaster last week when a young boy plunged about 40 feet from a zip line. The child survived after falling into a lake and being rescued by multiple bystanders.
Video of the harrowing ordeal at Fundidora Park in Monterrey, Mexico, shows the young boy sliding across the zip line accompanied by an adult. When they appear to be approaching the end of the line, they stop moving, and the boy suddenly plummets as a woman is heard screaming.
According to local media outlet ABC Noticias, the boy fell about 12 meters — nearly 40 feet.
J Cesar Sauceda wrote on Facebook that his younger brother had fallen into a lake and survived.
"I had not had the time to first, thank God for saving my brother from this spectacular accident caused by the bad team of both staff and the zip line," Sauceda wrote on Facebook, according to a translation, blaming "terrible service, terrible installation and above all, terrible training of the staff."
Nataly Moreno, their sister, said on Facebook that her younger brother is 6 years old and that the incident occurred when his "harness broke." A tourist who was nearby "jumped to save him," she said, but because of how deep the lake was, she said they both started to drown, and her boyfriend and another brother had to go into the lake to rescue them.
Citing the Civil Protection Agency, ABC Noticias said that the 6-year-old's harness had "burst," causing him to fall. Photos that Sauceda shared on Facebook show what appears to be what once was one connected piece of the harness shredded into two.
"The park does not have people trained for this type of situation, none was to help get it out of the water," she said, according to a translation. "Terrible park, it's incredible how disastrous things can happen in the blink of an eye."
The incident, which occurred June 25, prompted Nuevo Leon's Civil Protection Agency to suspend the zip lines that are part of Parque Amazonia, the privately-operated adventure park within Fundidora Park. Fundidora said on Facebook that the incident sparked an "exhaustive investigation" to determine what happened.
"In this new era of the Park where the priority is experience and security for our guests, we will continue to implement all the necessary measures to guarantee the concessionaires fulfill their contracts rigorously," Fundidora Park said on Facebook.
Parque Amazonia has not released a statement about the incident.