A visitor to the newly reopened theme park captured the scary moment on video
A Disney World cast member portraying Brave’s Princess Merida recently showed just how brave her character can be after the horse she was riding got spooked by a balloon.
In a video taken by a guest visiting Orlando’s Magic Kingdom park on its reopening day July 11, the fiery-haired princess from the 2012 animated film is seen trotting down Main Street on the back of a brown-and-white horse, waving to visitors.
Seconds into the clip, a child on the side of the street appears to lose his Mickey balloon, which drifts towards the horse — the string wrapping around the animal’s back left leg. The horse quickly became spooked by the balloon, kicking up his legs and bucking in an attempt to get free.
Though there were two cast members acting as animal handlers walking and holding onto the horse while the princess was riding, it soon became hard to control the animal. Thankfully Merida was able to safely slide herself off the horse and quickly got to the ground and out of its way.
The guest who recorded the video recounted the scene, noting, «I began filming one of the new mini-parades at the Magic Kingdom. A family comes up from behind me, and one member of the family is a toddler with a balloon. Merida notices the toddler and she waves at him. I think, ‘wow, that’s great!’ But then the toddler starts running into the parade route with his balloon. The father grabs his son and pulls him back, but the toddler’s balloon kept going and hit the horse, and wrapped around the horse’s leg.”
The video owner also added that the princess appeared to be holding “on for dear life” when the horse became upset.
Disney confirmed to PEOPLE that there were no injuries and the cast member and horse are doing fine.
