A 2-year-old girl fell from Casino Pier's Sky Ride in Seaside Heights, New Jersey, around 7:40 p.m. last Monday, tumbling first onto an entrance platform and then down to the sand before the chairlift even began moving. Her 31-year-old aunt jumped down after her in a bid to help, while a 3-year-old boy who remained stranded on the ride was brought down safely by firefighters using a ladder.
The Sky Ride is a chairlift-style attraction that carries passengers roughly 10 to 12 feet above the boardwalk, according to Fox News. Seaside Heights Police Department Detective Steve Korman told Toms River Patch that the woman who jumped after the toddler was the girl's aunt, and that the family involved was visiting from Bridgeton, New Jersey. Fire Chief Tim Farrell told the Asbury Park Press, as relayed by Fox News, that the girl fell onto the entrance platform first before landing on the sand.
No Injuries Reported, But Hospital Trip Ordered Out of Caution
EMS staff checked the girl immediately after the fall, and first responders reported that neither she nor her aunt displayed obvious injuries or complained of pain at the scene. Even so, the same Patch report notes that Tri-Boro First Aid transported both the toddler and her aunt to Community Medical Center in Toms River, with the trip described as a precaution rather than a response to visible harm.
Casino Pier staff shut the Sky Ride down following the fall. Police told the Asbury Park Press that the ride appeared to be functioning properly and reported no apparent defects, with no indication of a mechanical malfunction at the time of that assessment.
State Regulators Investigate Ride Incident
The New Jersey Department of Community Affairs, which oversees amusement ride inspections and licensing statewide, is investigating the incident, Fox News reported. Under New Jersey Administrative Code 5:14A-4.13, ride operators must report any injury requiring first aid or emergency evacuation to the department within 24 hours, followed by a full written report within five days, per the department's own guidance.
The department also requires every operating amusement ride in the state to pass annual mechanical, structural, and electrical inspections to earn its operating permit. Under the state's Carnival-Amusement Rides Safety Act, regulators can order an unsafe ride shut down immediately.
A 1983 Ride With a History of Surviving the Shore
Casino Pier's Sky Ride opened in 1983 and was built by Borvig, according to Fox News. It's one of the few Casino Pier attractions that survived Superstorm Sandy in October 2012, a storm that tore apart major sections of the pier and swept other prominent rides into the ocean, per Lift Blog. The pier has had at least one earlier ride-fall scare: in July 2018, a 51-year-old woman suffered minor injuries while helping her children off the Crazy Bus attraction, prompting a temporary shutdown and notification of state authorities, according to Wikipedia's list of incidents at independent amusement parks.
Casino Pier's own rules require Sky Ride passengers to be at least 36 inches tall, and children between 36 and 42 inches must ride with an adult at least 18 years old. It remains unclear whether the toddlers involved in Monday's fall met those height and age requirements or how boarding was supervised by park staff, questions that have not yet been publicly answered. It's also unclear what, if anything, the Department of Community Affairs' review will change about how the chairlift operates before Casino Pier brings the Sky Ride back online.
Fox News Digital reported contacting both the Seaside Heights Police Department and the Seaside Heights Fire Department for comment on the incident.
