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Ride/park accidents in 2013/2014

:eek:

Another Intamin...



Edit: According to Screamscape, the woman on NTG may have slipped through the restraint. Sounds like these may need attention if it's possible to do that on-ride, but Six Flags attractions have sent riders around without properly checking restraints on numerous occasions, so it could also be that. Still, very tragic. :(


Double edit: The trains aren't RMC, they were made by Gerstlauer, so it's down to either Six Flags or Gerstlauer, not RMC.


Triple Edit: I've heard this story more than once (especially with Six Flags). Sounds like the woman was too large for the ride and the op couldn't fasten her in safely. Apparently she was panicking because she only heard one click while others had more. :/
 
Major accident at a six flags park once again, this time on a relatively "new" coaster.... The new Texas giant.

A woman has died after falling from the tallest steel-hybrid roller-coaster in the world.
The accident happened at the Six Flags Over Texas theme park in Arlington, Texas. Park officials confirmed the woman died but did not specify how she was killed.

However, witnesses said they saw the woman fall from the Texas Giant rollercoaster.

"She goes up like this, then when it drops to come down, that's when it (the safety bar) released and she just tumbled," said Carmen Brown who saw the accident happened.

Brown said she was next in line behind the woman and saw her being strapped into her seat next to her son.

"We heard her screaming. We were like, 'Did she just fall?’" Brown said.

Six Flags expressed sadness over the death and said it was temporarily closing the section of the park around the accident site.

"Our thoughts and prayers are with the family and friends during this difficult time," the park said in a statement.

The Texas Giant is 14 storeys high, has a drop of 79 degrees and a bank of 95 degrees. It can carry up to 24 riders.

The ride first opened in 1990 as an all-wooden coaster but underwent a $10m (£6.54m) renovation in 2010 to install steel-hybrid rails before reopening in 2011.
 
BigAl said:
Triple Edit: I've heard this story more than once (especially with Six Flags). Sounds like the woman was too large for the ride and the op couldn't fasten her in safely. Apparently she was panicking because she only heard one click while others had more. :/
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I'm not sure about the truth of that last story. The trains being Gerstlauer, the restraints use a hydraulic system and don't ratchet.

This is obviously a tragic incident under any circumstance but if the restraint didn't open, it makes it all the more concerning. It could be a case of the rider being too large for the ride but even so, this should have been recognised and the fail-safes shouldn't have allowed the train to leave the station.

Hopefully, they can find a way to prevent this from happening again without compromising the ride experience and I hope that this doesn't have too much of negative impact on RMC or SFoT.

This is the most high profile incident we've seen with the level of social networking we have these days so we'll have to see how this pans out. I've already seen countless hyperbolic and ill-informed comments surrounding this incident.
 
I believe I saw a video somewhere which does seem to suggest that even if larger people are correctly secured i.e. the restraint is locked within it's lockable parameters and that the computer senses no problem, those larger people are far less secure when negative g-force is exerted with the combination of a lap bar simply due to the physical limit of design the lap bar has. Although, I still believe the official report may bring something up.

EDIT: Here is the video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i0KmTMf0VVQ#
 
CGM said:
BigAl said:
Triple Edit: I've heard this story more than once (especially with Six Flags). Sounds like the woman was too large for the ride and the op couldn't fasten her in safely. Apparently she was panicking because she only heard one click while others had more. :/
Click to expand...

I'm not sure about the truth of that last story. The trains being Gerstlauer, the restraints use a hydraulic system and don't ratchet.

This is obviously a tragic incident under any circumstance but if the restraint didn't open, it makes it all the more concerning. It could be a case of the rider being too large for the ride but even so, this should have been recognised and the fail-safes shouldn't have allowed the train to leave the station.

Hopefully, they can find a way to prevent this from happening again without compromising the ride experience and I hope that this doesn't have too much of negative impact on RMC or SFoT.

This is the most high profile incident we've seen with the level of social networking we have these days so we'll have to see how this pans out. I've already seen countless hyperbolic and ill-informed comments surrounding this incident.
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Good point! Now you mention it, I do remember the video Screamscape posted about a while back regarding the NTG modifications to make trains move continuously through the station and the riders weren't clicking the restraints. I couldn't remember if the restraints would be exactly the same as their own coasters.

It's certainly going to be interesting when more is found out about the cause of this awful incident. I still feel it's unfair to pin the blame on RMC purely for being a relatively new company because this can and has happened to rides built by bigger and more well-known companies too. If this incident was down to the size of the rider, if getting Gerstlauer to develop new restraints is impractical or too expensive, new regulations on the size of riders may need to be put in place to prevent further incidents like this occurring.

Has this happened on any other hydraulic restraint systems?
 
My thoughts go out to children of the victim who saw this tradegy and to the others on the train.

Having rode this last year, the amount of ejector is quite high,especially the place where it apparently happened.

Tragic...
 
The video simulation is really quite striking, but a very good illustration of what can happen with lap bars...

A tragic accident.
 
There's some more information about the incident at Six Flags.

Rosy Esparza has been identified as the victim and her son witnessed the accident and tried to run onto the track to help her.

Gerstlauer have commented on the situation saying that nothing like this has happened in 30 years of their service. They have sent a team to the site to investigate the cause of the incident.

Eye witnesses have told of how the woman was saying that she wasn't secured in properly whilst the ride was in the station but she was either ignored or was not heard by the operators.

Also, the woman was overweight but Six Flags and Gerstlauer are unsure if this may have caused the accident due to the lap bar not fully closing.

There's more news about this incident coming in.
 
Just reading Screamscape and it appears that Six Flags have closed Iron Rattler as a precaution while investigations are completed on the New Texas Giant.

Screamscape have also posted about Cedar Point's incident and also a few others that have occurred over over last week:

Park News - (7/22/13) The latest updates to the Shoot the Rapids accident on Friday at Cedar Point say that the boat that slid down the first lift hill before flipping over into the nearby water held seven riders. Six of which were treated at the scene but a seventh was taken to a nearby hospital for possible head trauma and was later treated and released as well.
The ride remains closed while the accident is under investigation, but I do have to wonder if we might see some kind of sweeping change made to the restraint system before they can reopen it. I’ve always felt that having any kind of locking restraint system on a boat ride was a bad idea and Cedar Point is very lucky that no one died from this.
In other news, this hasn’t exactly been the best week for Cedar Point at all. In addition to what now appears to have been a cable that shattered on SkyHawk early in the week (see picture), the park also had a maintenance employee get hurt in the middle of the night while working on Millennium Force and then had a guest return from a ride on Gatekeeper in an unresponsive state after suffering from an unknown medical condition. CP paramedics resuscitated him and took him to a local medical center for treatment.
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BigAl said:
A girl has lost her foot after an incident at Walibi Holland on the El Rio Grande river rapids ride.
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An accident on a rapids ride that's not made by Intamin! What a rare occurrence!

Pretty horrific accident whatever it is, can't imagine how that injury could occur on that ride type.
 
Alastair said:
BigAl said:
A girl has lost her foot after an incident at Walibi Holland on the El Rio Grande river rapids ride.
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An accident on a rapids ride that's not made by Intamin! What a rare occurrence!

Pretty horrific accident whatever it is, can't imagine how that injury could occur on that ride type.
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Standing up then falling out and getting crushed/battered?
 
If I remember rightly those Vekoma boats work like Hafema's, where they're built in segments which are hinged together so the boat can fold and bend as needed. It allows for drops and large features to be made safely and easily. Could she of put her foot in the join and had the boat fold in on it?

It's a possibility I'd imagine...
 
Is there not something in place to prevent that from happening though? Surely they wouldn't be allowed to have guests place their feet near exposed moving parts on a ride? I thought there was something covering the segments? :S
 
My thoughts exactly, Al. Although good idea originally Ian.

I think I remember seeing a video of said boats and the movement is minimal anyway, not enough of an opening to get a foot in for sure.

Surely she must have out her leg outside the boat. Although it must be awful for the person who has lost a foot, I hate seeing people messing about on rapid rides. Dangerously messing about I mean, not just the usual TS antics ;)
 
Well I'm just going off the Hafema ones, as I've seen those first hand. They flex quite a lot, and there's no real cover over the joint. Sometimes water even splashes through and soaks you with no warning :p It's no where near the footwell, so you wouldn't accidentally slip your foot in there, but you could put it in there if you wanted to for whatever reason!
 
I did that Rapids in 2011.

The flex was considerable.

Sent from my GT-I9300 using Tapatalk 2
 
Future versions should be fitted with some kind of flexible rubber mat to cover the floor of the boat that lets water run out, allows for the segments to move easily and also provides a little bit more grip for riders getting in and out.
 
BigAl said:
Future versions should be fitted with some kind of flexible rubber mat to cover the floor of the boat that lets water run out, allows for the segments to move easily and also provides a little bit more grip for riders getting in and out.
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You're our best shot at getting in the industry ;)
 
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