Hurricane Sadie Racks Florida: Tragedy at FantasticLand Theme Park
Last month, a hurricane more powerful than any in history fully broadsided the eastern coast of Florida. The effects of the hurricane, dubbed Hurricane Sadie, were felt along the totality of the Florida shoreline. The wind and subsequent flooding destroyed power grids, battered inland businesses, and left hundred of thousands homeless. Local authorities were instantly outmatched. The National Guard was dispatched but we’re in over their heads. The Red Cross could only help so much. Two weeks later, thousands of people had died, not of drowning or the direct effects of the storm, but of neglect, exposure, and a lack of fresh water. Some smaller communities were not contacted until almost a month after the storm, in most cases far too late to do any good. Before the FantasticLand story broke, the phrase "America's Shame" had been attached to the response effort and was gaining traction.
It was only when the situation came under a reasonable amount of control, and billions in federal government aid had been disbursed, that the story of FantasticLand hit with a crash that shattered all other news stories about the disaster. It sounded like an urban legend at first--far too "out there" to be real. Only after the ruins of the once mighty amusement park appear in online video footage did it become clear that the worst stories were true. Shockingly true, unbelievably true, but undeniable.
Of the 326 employees who stayed behind in the park, 207 were eventually evacuated. The fate of the 119 missing souls may never be known, but evidence of death and slaughter was immediately apparent. Photos soon emerged: heads on spikes outside of rides, corpses floating in detention cells, and viscera decaying in the humid Florida sun. FantasticLand, where "Fun Is Guaranteed!", was covered in blood. There were human bones littering the gift shops. It was all the country could talk about. The coverage crossed all media, breaking records for hits, views, likes, clicks, and shares.
The most indelible images, the one most of the public saw first, is among the most haunting photos of the past fifty years. Captured by photojournalist Ophir Bouhouche, the photo shows the seventy-five-foot-tall FantasticLand logo, a bright red Exclamation Point at the center of the 2,200-acre amusement park, shattered into thousands of jagged pieces on the ground. In its place, a crude yardarm stretches between support towers that once held the Exclamation Point in place. Hanging from the plank are five bodies, strung by their necks. Two nooses are empty, the bodies visible on the ground. One has simply fallen. The other has been decapitated. Behind the bodies, a sign boasts in bright red letters, FUN IS GUARANTEED!
Reinforcements were called immediately. By the time employees broke their silence and began telling their stories, the media were scrambling and desperate to get on the scene. Unfortunately for FantasticFun Inc., the legal owner of the park, an uploaded video showed National Guard troops entering the park the very day a press conference downplaying the carnage was held. The footage aired side by side on most networks. Details began to emerge, bringing with them a flood of unanswerable, terrible questions.
How could a group of survivors, mostly children, commit such terrible acts? How could survivors with the best possible circumstances in which to weather the storm and its aftermath produce the worst possible result? What does this say about our children? Ourselves? Is every American teenager just a few short steps away from bloodthirsty savagery? How do we prevent this in the future? Was an American institution that had provided joy to children since the 1970s fatally harmed by this incident, or is redemption possible?"
This event was even more remarkable by the fact that there was no warning about this hurricane. Like many other weather Phenomenon in the news lately, This storm appeared over night, Right off the coast. Nothing like this has happened in recorded history.