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Bounce House Disaster

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In mid-May of this year, three kids –ages 5, 6 and 10 fell out of an inflatable bounce house after a gust of wind lifted it 50 feet off of the ground. According to witnesses, they saw the bounce house rise above both the trees and a nearby apartment building due to the small tornado. The 10-year-old girl fell out first. She sustained scrapes and a minor injury to her shoulder. As the inflatable floated higher, the other two children fell out. One boy was dropped onto a parked car and the other landed in the street. Witness Taylor Seymour recalls, “It dropped off the first little kid in the middle of the road, then it came the other way, it passed over my apartment, it dropped the second one, he hit his head on the back of my car and then he fell to the ground.” The boy who landed on the car suffered a serious head injury and the boy landing on the pavement suffered two broken arms, a broken facial bone and jaw and a ruptured spleen. The bounce house floated over a stretch of woods and landed in an athletic field behind a middle school.

Owners of bounce house companies do not suggest purchasing these toys at local stores. The difference in weight between professional grade inflatables and those sold at toy stores could be the difference between safety and disaster. Tom Barber, the owner of Bounce Around, suggests that if parents do decide to buy small inflatables they also purchase corkscrew stakes that are used to secure large dogs. They only cost $3.50 a piece and will not pull out of the ground.

If your child has been hurt playing in a bounce house, contact us at (404) 622-5337 for a consultation. Visit mcaleerlaw.com for more information.