One child was killed and another was injured after a wind gust blew a bounce house into the air at a baseball game in Maryland on Friday night, local officials said.

Local emergency personnel received a call in Waldorf, Maryland, at about 9:21 p.m. Friday from the Regency Furniture Stadium reporting that a moon bounce house became airborne because of a wind gust while children were inside.

At the time, the Southern Maryland Blue Crabs minor league baseball team was playing a game, and “the moon bounce was carried approximately 15 to 20 feet up in the air, causing children to fall before it landed on the playing field,” according to a news release from the Charles County government posted on its website.

A 5-year-old boy from La Plata, Maryland, was flown to Children’s National Hospital in Washington, where he was later pronounced dead, the release said. A second child also was flown out by Maryland State Police with non-life-threatening injuries.

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80 points

Do folks not anchor these‽ this is so freakin’ sad.

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5 points

They’re supposed to be, yes.

I’m morbidly curious about how they were hurt from the fall. The article implies they fell out of the house, which I guess makes sense, because if they were still inside, it would have provided a soft landing.

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-1 points
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2 points

Well at least you took the time to summarize the pertinent part and complain about having to do it! Time is valuable, and I appreciate your sacrifice.

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3 points

I recently saw one which had foot-long stakes driven at an angle. I wonder if that would be secure enough. I didn’t consider wind as a major threat at the time.

It also had a big pocket on the front that said in big letters that it just always contain the manual — empty, obviously.

They often have mesh (not bouncy) sides, and even landing from 20’ on your neck on the inflated surface seems like it could be deadly. How awful.

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1 point

That had to be the magic-bullet of wind gusts. Tragic.

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12 points
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They are supposed to be secured, in fairly sure

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11 points

Yeah I’m picturing ground stakes like a tent, right? I’ll settle for a rope to a nearby tree stump.

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4 points

Yes. They have loops on the edges to be able to stake them in.

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31 points

They would have to drive the anchors deep into the ground to have any effect. The types of anchors I’ve seen on these things are little more than tent stakes to keep it stationary.

I think these need to be strapped to concrete barrels to be safe. Or banned if there is any wind over some limit.

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-4 points

They need to be banned. This happens almost every year.

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10 points

One child almost every year is a staggeringly low incidence rate. If that’s enough to get banned then children should also not be allowed near pet dogs, the beach, family members, heavy furniture, inside cars, or outside.

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3 points

Just like pool drownings right?

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13 points

We used to have our trampoline secured with the corkscrew type anchors. I wonder if those are strong enough. I know our trampoline never budged with those.

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