Anyone who’s a serious fan of Sonic, or of Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, is probably aware of the 1993 event in which a Sonic the Hedgehog float became caught in high winds, struck a lamppost and injured two people. The thing is, despite knowing this happened, for over 20 years we didn’t have any surviving video of the incident.
This story was originally published in 2019.
Yes, for the longest time any report of the crash would show either photographs of the deflated Sonic float lying on the ground, or file footage of it during testing. If you actually wanted to see Sonic hit a snag and come down, the footage was mysteriously missing from the internet.
No longer! Earlier this week, ABC7NY shared some archive footage of the 1997 Macy’s Parade, in which a Cat in the Hat float injured four onlookers. And as part of that segment (spotted by @RenandStimpySon), there was file footage of the 1993 parade, clearly showing Sonic hitting a lamppost, splitting his face open then coming down on top of the crowd.
(If it doesn’t autoplay correctly, skip to 1:38)
While nobody was seriously hurt, both a child and an off-duty police officer were “slightly injured”. Sonic the Hedgehog, meanwhile, was patched up and returned in 1994, looking good as new, to be the lead float in that year’s parade.
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The History Of Gaming Balloons In The Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade
The annual Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade (often shortened to Macy’s Day Parade) has been a U.S. tradition since 1924. For many families the event is as much a part of the Thanksgiving Day celebration as the feast itself, parents and children gathering in the streets of New York City or pajama-clad in front of their television sets on Thanksgiving morning.