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Wales Online
Wales Online
National
Steffan Rhys

Center Parcs ride Tropical Cyclone investigated after raft flips over injuring man and two children

The Tropical Cyclone ride at Center Parcs in Longleat is the focus of an investigation after a raft flipped over, injuring a man and two children.

The man was taken to hospital with suspected broken ribs, while both children suffered minor head injuries. They were a boy aged 12 and a girl aged 13.

Center Parcs apologised for the upset caused but said it was "simply an unfortunate accident". It happened on August 19. Wiltshire Council said a health and safety officer was investigating.

There have been 23 reports of rafts overturning on the Tropical Cyclone in the last six months, the BBC reports.

They happened across the four Center Parcs villages that have the ride: Longleat Forest, Elveden Forest, Sherwood Forest and Woburn Forest.

But a Center Parcs spokesman told the BBC that incidents of rafts overturning were "extremely rare" and more than 340,000 rafts have travelled safely down the course in the last six months.

The man involved told the BBC that he and his family had been on the ride "countless" times before.

"We went into thin air and that's why we flipped," he said.

"The thing that I really remember was the cracking sound of my ribs hitting the side of the flume."

The man was taken to hospital and says he still has pain in his ribs and back. He said his niece had a bump above her eye, bruising to her chin and suffered a headache for about a week afterwards.

Center Parcs confirmed all three passengers sustained minor injuries and said the ride was closed for safety checks after the incident. It added that it was confident there were "no issues" with the ride and that staff had correctly loaded the raft.

The spokesman also told the BBC that the ride was fully certified, covered by a risk assessment and had control measures in place to mitigate risks.

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