Supermodel Fabio Lanzoni, as some of you may remember, is a pioneer in going viral. On March 30, 1999, Lanzoni attended a promotional event at Busch Gardens Williamsburg in Virginia, where he was among the first to ride the new Apollo’s Chariot roller coaster. At some point in the process, an incident involving a goose appears to have been greatly exaggerated. Shortly thereafter, photos began to circulate of Lanzoni with blood on his face, and a number of sources were soon reporting that the bird had flown into him and died.
The whole thing was so bizarre that many believed it was an April Fool’s Day gag due to the timing. “But it was not funny. It was no joke,” Lanzoni told People in 2024. He also claimed that the story was at least partially untrue. In fact, Lanzoni points to the coverage of the ordeal as “the beginning of ‘fake news,’” because, according to him, it wasn’t the goose that actually struck him that day.
Fabio Finally Explained What Really Hit Him on That Roller Coaster
“So the roller coaster goes down at 80 miles an hour…over a pond and back up, and then upside down,” Lanzoni explained. “So what happened is, over the pond there was a bunch of geese there. I’m talking about hundreds,” he continued. “And one got sucked in. I saw this very up close…the goose hit the video camera. The video camera shattered. At 85 miles per hour.”
Lanzoni went on to reveal that a piece of metal from the camera hit him, not the goose itself. However, the goose did die in the accident, which Lanzoni said resulted from the roller coaster being built in the path of migrating birds. But despite all the blood in the pictures, Lanzoni only had a small cut on the bridge of his nose that required just a single stitch. Lanzoni further alleged that the ride’s video footage mysteriously disappeared and still hasn’t turned up years later.
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