Family plans to sue Adventureland after tot's injury

Augustuly 15, 07 9:50 PM | NewsDay

Days after a 6-year-old boy's hand was mangled at Adventureland in Farmingdale, his family is planning to sue the park, their attorney said Wednesday.

Charlie DeMarco of Bellmore lost his balance on the Super Raider, a walk-through attraction, at about 2:30 p.m. Saturday, said attorney David Woycik of Mineola. He fell on a portion of the it where kids cross an elevated walkway of moving metal plates and ended up with his hand stuck between one of the horizontal plates and a vertical wall on the side of the ride, Woycik said.

Charlie was at the park with his mother and sister, who immediately rushed to his aid and yanked his bloodied hand from the crevice, Woycik said. Skin was ripped to the bone in spots along the side of the boy's hand in what Woycik called a "degloving injury" where the skin was stripped off, and for now, he has lost mobility.

"She was horrified, the mother," Woycik said. She did not respond to requests for comment.

Woycik said the Adventureland staff was not fast enough in responding to the accident, and that the injury might have been prevented if the ride was properly supervised. "A fun day at the amusement park and you don't expect your son's hand to be mangled, he said.

But Paul Gentile, the park's operations manager, said only a minute elapsed before the boy was tended to, and the boy's family even thanked him for Adventureland's response.

The boy's injury comes about two years after two people were killed in the same week at the park. In September 2005, an 18-year-old Adventureland worker died after he was run over by the roller coaster he was operating. Two days later, a 45-year-old woman was thrown from a ride and died after her body slammed into a car in the Adventureland parking lot.

The Super Raider was still open as of Wednesday afternoon, with a short line of small children antsy to enter.

Gentile said thousands of children have been on the Super Raider for years without incident and said he saw no need to shut the ride down.

He said the ride would be reviewed. "I wouldn't call it a problem," he said. "People get injured on various rides in the park. He's just a child who lost his balance and injured his hand."

There have been other injuries on the ride this year, Gentile said, but he could not be specific.

One Adventureland patron said Wednesday the park may not have been vigilant enough.

"Wow," said Peggy Burke, who sat on a ledge at Super Raider Wednesday waiting for her 9-year-old and 11-year-old granddaughters to exit. "I was just saying to my husband I have heard about accidents happening here. They should have shut it down for a few days at least and taken a look at the problem."

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