Officials in Alabama say at least four people died over the past few months while performing a deadly TikTok trend involving speeding boats.
The individuals jumped or flipped off the backs of the vessels while they were moving, breaking their necks and drowning, the New York Post reported Saturday.
The drownings could have been avoided, said Captain Jim Dennis of the Childersburg Rescue Squad.
“They were doing a TikTok challenge. It’s where you get in a boat going at a high rate of speed, you jump off the side of the boat, don’t dive, you’re jumping off feet first and you just kinda lean into the water,” he explained.
Video footage posted on TikTok appears to show individuals jumping off a speeding vessel, and the clip’s caption features the hashtag “boat jumping.”
@dayyachtcharters Would you like to be jumping off this boat right now? #boatjumping #yacht #charter #cabo #mexico #bahamas #seattle #cayman #yachtscayman #cancun #fyp
According to the captain, the so-called “boat jumping” trend has plagued first responders for two years but accelerated during the opening months of 2023.
“The first victim died in February after plunging into the Coosa River while his wife and their children watched from inside the boat,” the Post article said, adding three other people ignored warnings and later came to the same end.
An image shows what appears to be a man flipping upside down before landing in the water:
Gail Kulp who is the Executive Director of the Sea Tow Foundation, told WJAR it was similar to falling from heights onto concrete.
“Water is not soft to land on when you are going at speed,” the director noted, adding the person would end up with a broken neck and broken bones.
“If you are not wearing a life jacket when you do it, by the time the boat circles back around to come get you most likely you will have drowned,” Kulp warned.
People who are being filmed are more likely to behave poorly because “they want to show off in front of their friends or for like, social media,” one young man told ABC 7:
Now, Dennis hopes boaters will not participate in the trend telling people to avoid it because, “It’s not worth your life.”