It was the final day of school and grade 5 and 6 children were celebrating at a 'Big Day In' activity day in Devonport, in Tasmania's north-west.
Four primary school children have died in a jumping castle incident after wind picked up the inflatable on the final day of school in Tasmania's north-west.WARNING: This story contains details of the incident and photographs that some readers may find distressing.About 10am at the sports oval at Hillcrest Primary School in Devonport, a gust of wind picked up a jumping castle as well as several zorb balls and hurled them into the air.
The jumping castle rose about 10 metres and pulled kids with it, according to eyewitness reports to police. Children fell from the jumping castle, with some people landing on the oval and others off the hilly slope at the edge of the oval.How many children were hurt? Four children have died — two boys and two girls — all in grade 5 and 6, on their final school day of the year.Children were airlifted to hospital after the incident.Several helicopters came to the scene to ferry victims to hospitals.Police called it a "wind event" and a "gust" but the nearest weather bureau monitoring site, about 10 kilometres away at Devonport Airport, did not record anything out of the ordinary.
Bureau of Meteorology duty forecaster Anna Forrest said the strongest gust recorded at the airport around the time of the incident was only 22 kilometres per hour, "which is not atypical for the area and wouldn't be considered extremely strong".
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