Victims were moved to faulty gondola

They switched seats just before the deadly ride started.

The four riders who were locked in the gondola that violently ripped off the Fire Ball ride at the Ohio State Fair — including the man who was killed — originally had been assigned different seats.

But the ride operator moved them to the defective gondola just before it began to move.

Multiple witnesses interviewed by the State Highway Patrol said that a passenger who had boarded the ride was too large for a safety harness to latch, so the operator moved that passenger to what ended up being the defective gondola, where some seats were a bit larger. The three other passengers moved so they could sit together, the report said.

The State Highway Patrol released a 61-page report

about the July 26 incident on Thursday.

Some passengers who occupied other gondolas when the ride broke said the safety harness didn’t appear to ever latch properly, but the ride started up anyway.

Dylan Walsh, a rider seated in the gondola next to the one that detached, said the ride worker still had trouble getting the safety harness to latch even after the group of friends moved. He said he heard the worker say “whatever, it’s fine,” and “Oh well, you will be all right.” But about a minute into the ride, he saw a woman “go flying.”

The man operating the ride for Amusements of America, Cesar Gabriel Alvarez

Martinez, told the Highway Patrol that the restraints did latch properly. He said that once he switched the passenger to a different gondola, he had no problem securing the harness.

The State Patrol report says that two people seated in the ill-fated gondola were thrown from their seats: Keziah Lewis, 19, of Columbus, and her boyfriend, Tyler Jarrell, who was seated next to her.

Jarrell was killed when the ride threw him high into the air and he hit the ground about 50 feet away. Lewis was critically injured and remains hospitalized.

The other two riders in the gondola were not thrown from their seats but were

injured when the gondola plunged to the ground.

About 23 minutes into the State Patrol interview with Martinez, attorneys for Amusements of America arrived and spoke privately with Martinez and three other ride operators. The interviews ended for the evening, but they resumed the next day with attorneys present.

Duwan Dowdy was working his first day as one of the Fire Ball operators and was riding the ride to assure others it was safe when the gondola collapsed, he told the Highway Patrol.

“Just before the ride started, my sister was supposed to be on that car, but she was too scared. ... She would have been dead right now.

“Man, I saw that latch and the car was not fastened, so I yelled to the operator again and again. He would not listen. I kept telling him that the car was not fastened, but he would not listen.”

Dowdy told investigators he was kicked in the face by Lewis as she was thrown from the ride when the arm on that four-seat gondola collapsed.

“Everything just happened, bodies falling all over,” he said. “I just closed my eyes. ... I couldn’t do anything but watch.”