Employees

If you could ask questions to theme park employees, specifically ride staff, in like a Q&A thing, what would you ask? Thinking of doing some research.

You may find replies in short supply from us lot, to be honest. A lot of members round here are current or ex-staff. And those of us that aren't have had enough conversations with those who are to have our questions answered many times over.
Not to mention that we have had Q&A sessions with park bosses in the past.

... That said, I've often wanted to ask John Wardley, "do you look at the state of Chessington and Towers these days and weep?"

Fair enough. And yes, that's something I would love to ask too haha!

Most theme park staff are happy to talk about their job, when they're working, you only have to ask them a few questions.

Questions I was typically asked in my time overseeing ride operations within an attraction at Merlin include:

"Can I see your pop badges please?"
"Can little one ride on my knee?"
"Where are the nearest toilets?"
"Can I speak to a manager please".

Questions I was asked a lot;

"Can you turn the water down please" (River rapids)
"Is it going to fall off the track"
"Make it stop upside down"
"Can the cameras see what we do on this ride" (Usually an over excitable young couple. Well, the cameras can see sunshine, in glorious HD... So can the floodlights that are about to be illuminated whilst you are mid 'flow'.)

Asking for the toilets is definitely the most common question asked, followed by 'doesn't my restraint go any tighter than this?'

Is it scary?
Does it go very Fast?
Is it safe?

I once asked a Smiler op about whether she had a uniform for every ride at the park.

Answer if I rememberr correctly was they tend to work the same ride but she did have a CBeebies uniform too as she worked there as well

Not sure what the staff think when I ask them stupid questions like that, but she was very friendly

Alsty said:

Asking for the toilets is definitely the most common question asked, followed by 'doesn't my restraint go any tighter than this?'

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I'm guilty of that one I love being strapped in tight especially on oblivian, Galactica and nemesis.

Do you enjoy working here?

Thanks for the suggestions, even the jokey ones lol.

MattyH said:

Do you enjoy working here?

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That question would get some interesting responses...

"Do you get free tickets?"

MaxPower said:

That question would get some interesting responses...

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Depends when you asked it... Saturday or Sunday mornings at 9:30am when many of the younger ride staff were probably still out in Hanley at gone-2am - yes, the answers would be interesting then! Other days you'd probably get a truthful answer.

There is a reason Towers switched the pay-day for weekly paid seasonal staff from Friday to Monday - to reduce weekend absence. Used to be hilarious on the Nemesis platform on Saturday / Sunday mornings when people were ringing in sick. They'd be put through to the ride to speak to the Team Leader who was signing it off. Team Leader would hear the excuse & confirm they were not coming in & then say to the Op "You're going to be missing wxyz today". It was quite common for someone to then say "Oh, I saw wxyz throwing up at 2:30am in Hanley"... I kid you not.

Back in the day I worked at a theme park in the states, and the most asked question by far was "Where do you come from?". One of the rides I managed was a log flume which had a standard script (Please remain seated, keep your hands and arms inside the boat, don't rock the boat. Enjoy your ride) which had to be said every time you loaded a boat. If I was covering, nearly every single boat you would be asked.

My favourite though, by far was when working on a launched coaster with inversions which had a lap bar. A guy who had no legs got to the train and asked why he couldn't ride. Awkward, but I explained the issue. He began shouting at me saying I was discriminating etc. My response was "If you ride it you will die" - I believe he tried to sue the park.

Another one I got quite a bit was "Do you work here because you don't get paid much in your own country?" Which I always replied with "If I was doing this back home my hourly rate would be double. I'm just here for a working vacation" - they really didn't like that.