A camel at a Pittsburgh circus injured six children and an adult after it became spooked during show and ran amok around the arena.
The camel, part of Shrine Circus performance at PPG Paints Arena in Pittsburgh, began bucking on Sunday with a child attached to its back, tossing the girl from side to side.
In a video of the incident, recorded by attendee Ronald Smith and viewed more than 82,000 times on Facebook, the camel can be seen running through the ground floor of the arena while circus employees frantically chase after it.
Smith went to the circus with his girlfriend and her two toddlers. He said he thought about bringing the 2-year-old boy down to meet the animals, but decided against it.
"You just got bad vibes," Smith said. "I didn’t feel like that with tigers, but the camels were a little too free."
Smith said he once attended a monster truck show at the PPG Paints Arena, and the trucks splattered him with dirt. That experience made him sit farther away from the animals.
"With the animals we didn’t want to take that risk because they could go up into stands," he said, adding that he and his girlfriend sat 15 rows up from the ground floor.
The entire incident lasted 11 seconds, according to officials. In the video, the girl is removed from the camel and appears dazed, but is able to walk away.
Smith said the crowd began to run "like a tsunami" away from the bucking camel.
Six children were injured, five of which were taken to UPMC Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh. The sixth child was taken to UPMC Mercy with a fractured arm, which officials said was the worst of the injuries.
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The injured adult also was left with with minor injuries, according to officials.
After the commotion, the circus continued without issue, and no other people or animals were injured.
Shrine Circus did not immediately respond to a request for comment.