While catching up with some classmates at school on Tuesday morning, North Carolina ninth-grader Andrea Alonso suddenly felt an intense pain in her eye. “She was talking to her friends at the school door, and she felt that something hit her,” Andrea’s mother, Ana Rosa Alonso, told The Daily Beast.
After Andrea called her in a panic, Alonso rushed to Olympic High School in Charlotte and found the school nurse preparing her daughter to be taken to the hospital. “It was very scary,” Alonso recalled. “I was shaking because I didn’t know what the damage was. She told me it was in her eye, so I was thinking something really bad, like she could lose her eye.” “It,” in this case, was an Orbeez pellet.
“Squishy and smooth, kids and adults alike will love the soothing sensory experience of Orbeez!” Spin Master Ltd., the company behind Orbeez, explains on its website. “There’s no limit to the ways you can play. Explode them, squish them, squeeze them, bounce them, crush them or let them flow through your hands! Use your imagination and have endless amounts of fun with Orbeez!”
The official description sounds innocuous enough. But the polymer beads also play a central role in a viral social media trend popular among teens and have caused serious injuries across the country. The so-called Orbeez Challenge—which may or may not have emerged on TikTok—involves loading airguns with the gel-filled pellets and firing them at strangers.
The resulting videos are subsequently posted on platforms like TikTok and YouTube, where they have racked up millions of views. In certain instances, cops say kids freeze the beads, which makes them harder and more damaging, potentially leading to severe eye injuries, puncture wounds, and costly property damage.
According to KSBY, Authorities say this dangerous new TikTok trend has made its way to northern Santa Barbara County. On Friday, someone in a passing car reportedly fired what appeared to be an airsoft gun at a student, striking him several times right in front of Righetti High School.
“He had just hit the walk button to go cross the street, a car with three other teenagers in it stopped at the light, pulled out what seemed to be an airsoft pellet gun, pointed it at him, and shot,” said Hannah Luke, mother of the boy who was hit. “He was hit about seven times, once in the temple. He witnessed other kids being shot at. I guess they drove around Righetti twice.”
Authorities say that a dangerous new TikTok trend has made its way to northern Santa Barbara County. On Friday, someone in a passing car reportedly fired what appeared to be an airsoft gun at a student, striking him several times right in front of Righetti High School.
“He had just hit the walk button to go cross the street, a car with three other teenagers in it stopped at the light, pulled out what seemed to be an airsoft pellet gun, pointed it at him, and shot,” said Hannah Luke, mother of the boy who was hit. “He was hit about seven times, once in the temple. He witnessed other kids being shot at. I guess they drove around Righetti twice.”
