A fun trip with friends to the EVP World theme park in Chembarambakkam on Tuesday turned fatal for a 22-year-old flight attendant with Kingfisher Airlines after she was thrown off an ‘Octopus ride’ car. She suffered severe head injuries and died on the way to hospital.
Third accident
This is the third accident at the park in the last seven months, but the victims earlier escaped with minor injuries.
The recent victim, Afia Magh, a native of Kohima, Nagaland, was residing with Oli, also a flight attendant, and two others, in a rented house in Kothari Nagar, Ramapuram.
Around 10 a.m. on Tuesday, Ms. Afia with her roommates and six others visited the EVP theme park on Chennai-Bangalore National Highway.
Speaking to The Hindu , Ms. Afia’s friend Prachurya Saikia, an engineering college student, who was in the group, said, “It had individual seating cars with safety rods in front. As it was in motion there was sudden violent jerk. I saw Afia fall out of her car 10 ft below. The operator fled his cabin when he saw Afia fall. She got badly hit on the back of her head by a car behind her,” said Prachurya.
“The cars were running at full speed and Afia’s friends who did not take the ride and were watching pulled her out after a 10-minute struggle while I was stranded in the car,” Prachurya added.
Other than the ‘safety rod’, the cars have no safety belt or harness to restrain occupants in the event of jerks.
Afia was rushed to Saveetha Hospital in Tiruverkadu where doctors pronounced her as ‘brought dead’.
Incident hushed up
Most visitors to theme park were unaware of the accident as the park authorities hushed it up by shutting the adventure ride. But they kept the other areas of the park open.
Nazarathpet police team reached the spot and carried out preliminary investigations.
Mediapersons thronging the park were denied entry into the premises. Police registered a case under Section 304 (ii) - culpable homicide not amounting to murder, and arrested the theme park manager Raghu (37), ride operator Williams (22) and his assistant Ashok (20).
