What happened at Six Flags? Video of brawl goes viral amid reports of shooting chaos

Hundreds of people were reportedly involved in a brawl inside Six Flags Over Georgia on the evening of March 2, 2024, Atlanta News First reported. According to the news outlet, officers of the Cobb County Police Department (CCPD) responded to a call from the amusement park.

They reached Atlanta’s Six Flags Over Georgia to help park security with a “sizeable unruly crowd” comprising around 500 to 600 people, who were reportedly “running through the park and fighting.”

When the team of law enforcement followed the crowd inside the parking lot near South Service Road, “an unknown number of suspects” allegedly opened fire. When the cops shot back, a 15-year-old boy was critically injured in the process and later rushed to the local Grady Memorial Hospital.

The Georgia Bureau of Investigation (GBI) is currently investigating the case. The video of the Six Flags brawl has now gone viral.

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Exploring the details of the Six Flags Over Georgia brawl

On Saturday evening, around 6.15 pm, shots were exchanged between the young people who were fighting inside the Six Flags Over Georgia and the Cobb County police officers. In the process, a 15-year-old boy was critically wounded and is now admitted to a hospital nearby, Atlanta News First reported.

It was the theme park’s opening day of the season when over 500 people were reportedly running around and hitting and arguing with one another in groups during dispersal. Unable to control the crowd and the brawl, Six Flags called the CCPD for assistance. However, many of the visitors fired at the cops and even hit an empty patrol car, forcing them to return fire.

Apart from the teenage boy, nobody else was injured, as per GBI, which is investigating the matter. Atlanta News First reported that a handgun was recovered from near the boy, whose name remains undisclosed.

“As officers identified where the shots were coming from, they ran after people who had run into the woods. During the incident, one CCPD officer fired his weapon, hitting one minor,” GBI told the reporters.

The agency also told the press that no officers were harmed during the gunfire. After the investigation is wrapped, the case will be handed over to the Cobb County District Attorney’s Office for review.

Images and videos of the brawl have garnered enough traction online. Here are some of the comments:

According to a Six Flags Over Georgia worker, who’s also a witness, she saw “young people” running around but didn’t realize that the matter was so serious. However, she told Atlanta News First that in the last six months she has been working in the park, a few youngsters tried to “attack” her once.

The female employee also wished the injured boy a speedy recovery and expressed her views that minors should be chaperoned and not left “unattended or unsupervised” inside such public places. She also mentioned how stricter security measures should be put in place to avoid such incidents in the future.

“Maybe they need more real officers here so they could sort of kind of pump some kind of fear into those types of people,” the woman added.

Meanwhile, here’s what Six Flags Over Georgia told the news outlet in a statement:

“It is incredibly disappointing that our community is disrupted at public events throughout the region by groups of underaged youth. Just like other venues in the area, we are committed to keeping this type of trouble outside our park and off our property.”

The statement further continued:

“There was police activity involving gunshots; we want to confirm there was no shooting at our property or parking lot. This took place on South Service Road which is not owned or operated by Six Flags.”

In addition, Six Flags stated that they were committed to providing a safer and more secure environment inside their park and urged the Atlanta community to join them. They also stated how such kinds of unruly activities won’t be entertained henceforth.

“Our goal is to provide safe, fun entertainment. We employ state-of-the-art security systems and metal detection, maintain a robust and vigilant Public Safety Department, and have strong support from Cobb County Police who are present both inside and outside the park,” they mentioned.

Six Flags also explained that every visitor who wished to enter the park should follow their strict guidelines, and failure to do so would result in a penalty.

This is not the first time the theme park has seen such a brawl. Last year too, on March 4, a similar incident happened, which led to the removal of “several groups of young people” from the venue due to “inappropriate behavior,” as per the Independent.