A seven-year-old boy who suffered head injuries after falling from a rollercoaster in Yorkshire is in a critical condition in hospital, police have said.

The boy was taken to Leeds General infirmary after the incident at the Lightwater Valley theme park, near Ripon, North Yorkshire, on Thursday.

Witnesses said the boy fell up to 15ft (4.5 metres) from the Twister ride at the attraction, with one saying they heard loud screams before seeing a child on the ground.

On Friday, North Yorkshire police said in statement: “The boy was taken to Leeds General infirmary with head injuries following the incident where he currently remains. However, his condition is now described as critical.”

The force clarified that the boy, who has not been named, is seven years old, not six as previously stated.

Clarifying the boy’s condition, North Yorkshire police said: “On arrival at hospital, the child was assessed and found to have injuries that would not have been apparent at the scene of the incident. The child remains in a critical but stable condition in hospital.”

In a statement, Lightwater Valley said: “We have been informed by North Yorkshire police that the medical condition of the child involved in the incident at the park yesterday has deteriorated overnight and he is now in a critical condition.

“We are devastated by this news and our thoughts are with the family. While the Health and Safety Executive investigation is continuing, we will support them and be guided by their advice.”

Witnesses said they saw the boy hanging out of the back of the moving ride, on which people board a waltzer-shaped carriage for “an epic ascent to the treetops”, according to the theme park’s website.

Mark Charnley said he saw the boy hanging out of the ride before falling “12 or 15ft” to the ground. “He was hanging outside of the actual carriage … two seconds after that he fell out of the carriage to the floor,” he told Sky News.



“After that, everybody in the queue started shouting at [the] operator of the ride to shut it down because he hadn’t noticed what had gone on. About 12 or 15 seconds after that, he realised what had happened and closed the machine down.”

Charnley said a woman he thought was the boy’s mother was still strapped into the ride as members of the public, including an off-duty police officer, jumped over safety barriers to attend to the child on the ground.



Charnley and his daughter soon left the park as she was too distressed to go on any rides. He said he was quite surprised the theme park was kept open afterwards.

Lara-Susan James, who was in the queue for the Twister ride, told the BBC: “We could hear a girl screaming, and I mean screaming. I thought she was just scared of being on the ride, but she was hysterical.

“They were part of a bigger party of people visiting the park, and they were on the ground just ahead of us. They started shouting to the operator to stop the ride. It was at that moment I realised something was wrong. I saw the operator apply the emergency stop and my husband pointed to the fallen kid on the ground, saying they had fallen out.”