Nine performers were injured in a horrifying circus accident at the Ringling Brothers and Barnum and Bailey Circus’ Legends show in Providence, Rhode Island on Sunday. The accident happened during the show’s hair-hanging act; several acrobats were suspended up to 35 feet in the air when a platform collapsed, causing them to fall to the ground.
According to WPRI, the circus accident happened approximately an hour into the show. The acrobats were doing their “human chandelier” hair-hanging routine when the metal-frame platform suspending them collapsed. Eight women fell during the accident, plus a dancer on the ground was injured; the performers were taken to the emergency room.
So far, very few details about the injuries have been released, but manager Roman Garcia said that everyone at the hospital was doing okay just two hours after the accident happened. “Everybody’s doing fine, everybody’s at the hospital, everybody’s conscious, everybody’s doing pretty well,” Garcia said.
Photos from the scene of the circus accident were posted to Twitter:
Circus accident leaves 9 acrobats seriously injured http://t.co/nbHM4LuZGa pic.twitter.com/utBenxMf28
— Circa (@Circa) May 4, 2014
Circus accident leaves nine injured http://t.co/VaCFyc451Z #WPSD pic.twitter.com/MugM7JFARh
— WPSD Local 6 (@WPSDLocal6) May 4, 2014
Check out an extended video of the accident below.
If you’ve never been to a Ringling Bros. show to see the hair-hanging act, here is a description of how the act is supposed to go, according to the show’s website.
These ‘hairialists’ perform a combination of choreography and cut-ups including spinning, hanging from hoops, and rolling down wrapped silks, all while being suspended 35 feet in the air by their hair alone. In this hair-raising act, audiences will even see the weight of three girls held aloft by the locks of only one of these tangled beauties.
A video of a different hair-hanging act is below–it looks painful enough, with taking a 35-foot plunge to the ground.
Fortunately this circus accident wasn’t as severe as others have been. It was just under a year ago that an acrobat died during a performance at Cirque du Soleil. Sarah Guyard-Guillot slipped from her safety cable and fell 50 feet to her death.
Image via Twitter
