Brave souls outlast ‘torture’ of Elitch Gardens' 24-hour coffin challenge

Five brave souls withstood perhaps the most daunting task that Denver’s own major theme park has ever thrown down.

Technically, they all survived living 24 hours in a coffin.

And, based on survivor testimonies, it almost seemed like the Elitch Gardens Pine Box challenge came out of an episode of Fear Factor.

Out of those who applied to participate, five people were selected by the park to participate in its newest Fright Fest event challenge.

Beginning on Saturday at 5:30 p.m., the five participants stepped into their coffins. Throughout the next 24 hours, they all were given challenges inside and outside the coffin, exposing them to some of their biggest fears.

Anyone could've left at any time — but no one did.

Pine Box challenge host Doug “Sprinkles” Swenson said the group was “tortured” through the night. Some acts included clowns and scare actors throwing sand on them into their coffin, solo trips through haunted houses, night roller coaster rides and bug eating.

“They tried to sleep and we hit them with flashing lights, loud horns and then yelled at them with a bunch of clowns at 2 a.m.,” Swenson said. “I can’t believe all five people are still here.”

But overall, the group all said the worst parts were the eating challenges.

“I’ve eaten things in the past couple days that I wouldn’t have imagined,” said Russell Gahagen, now a proud owner of two 2025 Elitch Gardens season and haunt passes.

“I did this because I wanted to challenge myself, and I did it,” he said.

Heather Jackson said she participated because of her children.

“I wanted to, like, show them that I can still do cool things that aren't just being a mom all the time, but it's gonna benefit them, because they're the ones getting the passes,” she said.

Adam Wratten moved to Denver a month ago, and said he did the pine box challenge as a way to honor him and his wife's weight loss journey by constantly challenging each other.

“We lost hundreds of pounds so we could ride roller coasters,” he said. “Now we could ride roller coasters. So the whole thing was, number one, could I do it? Number two, we got season passes to ride some roller coasters.”

Longtime Denver resident Hannah Metzger, former Denver Gazette and Colorado Politics staff writer, said she grew up going to Elitch Gardens every summer. So the chance to be in an empty theme park “was a really cool experience.”

What Jackson learned from the challenge, she said, is “even if you don't know, even if you don't think you can do something, you actually can.”