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Drayton Manor Park

Matt N said:
So Drayton can technically pay £500,000, but they don't view it as financially viable. That's fair, in my opinion; I'd personally rather Drayton spend the money on a brilliant new ride, if that's what their finances allow for!
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The park are preparing for a large fine after the rapids incident, I doubt that money will be spent on something new.
 
Sure there’s another solution from the manufacturer? Ie new trains?
Seems a waste of not very old track, if they sold it on the future buyer would be in the same boat.

What about changing the lift hill layout and using another manufacturer? Big drop into 1st loop


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Emma99 said:
Can't the death be classed as death by misadventure because the ride clearly states throughout to remain seated so is Drayton really at fault?

By all means I'm no expert in this sort of thing just wondering if anybody else sees what I mean by this?
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It can (and should), but that will alienate social warriors who spend their lives getting angry on other peoples behalf and I'm sure you can imagine some of the tripe they'd come out with, and of course the family won't get anything out of it, and Keith Vazz will look a prick (not difficult that last one).

As I said a few pages back, my suspicion is they are going over everything with a fine tooth comb to try and find fault with the park because they know "victim blaming" will create a riot and they're probably trying to work out a new description that doesn't immediately shout "she should have stayed sat down".

For those who think I'm being overly harsh on the family for being impatient over the speed the investigation is going and think like they do that it is because of her skin colour, it's not, my sister-in-law died earlier this year, she was white, middle aged and the family still don't have a death certificate, cause of death or inquest date and they've been told it may be another 3 years, anybody who suffers an unexpected death has a very long wait for stuff to be sorted out because of government cuts, your skin color has nothing to do with it (that was something I heard Vazz saying previously).
 
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Emma99 said:
Can't the death be classed as death by misadventure because the ride clearly states throughout to remain seated so is Drayton really at fault?

By all means I'm no expert in this sort of thing just wondering if anybody else sees what I mean by this?
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Isn’t one of the alleged issues how long it took to call the emergency services?


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pj said:
Isn’t one of the alleged issues how long it took to call the emergency services?
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But that wasn't the cause of the initial accident which resulted in her death. That's a bit like blaming the ambulance driver who picks you up because you crashed into a wall through driving too fast and suffered additional injuries due to the length of time it took them to cut you out the wreckage and drive you to hospital. Maybe if you hadn't driven into the wall in the first place... blah blah :)
 
The police have found them not guilty of any wrong doing.
This is now a HSE case where they will present all there foundings.
I think the park will not be hit hard but will be given a list of things needed to be done to the ride so it can be reissued a safety certificate.
This sort of death could have happened at Any of the uk parks but Merlin are now adding gates to there boats to hopefully stop it happening again.
 
Completely agree with every said above. If it does come to be the case it was death by misadventure the amount of crap that will come from will be stupid. But they can't pick faults with Drayton when potentially there isn't any to pick. If they done it all by the book and responded as quickly as possible. I can't see them getting a big fine if one at all because it was sort of self reflected in the aspect of not reading the signs on remaining seated. Personally I really hope it ends next month and splash canyons returns next season with added safety features as expected even new boats with doors like the merlin ones. They were fab rapids and is truly missed at the park in my opinion. I personally hope Drayton doesn't get hit too hard by it and the case ends so the family can finally be at peace to remember their daughter. Sorry if my post offends anyway too just in case it does.
 
IanSR said:
It can (and should), but that will alienate social warriors who spend their lives getting angry on other peoples behalf and I'm sure you can imagine some of the tripe they'd come out with, and of course the family won't get anything out of it, and Keith Vazz will look a prick (not difficult that last one).

As I said a few pages back, my suspicion is they are going over everything with a fine tooth comb to try and find fault with the park because they know "victim blaming" will create a riot and they're probably trying to work out a new description that doesn't immediately shout "she should have stayed sat down".
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Will it or are you just imagining people to be offended by? Do you have anything to suggest they're trying to blame the park, or again, are you just getting offended at things in your own imagination? The classic projection.
 
Martin said:
Do you have anything to suggest they're trying to blame the park...
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Just about every article about this is attempting to blame the park in one way or another, not enough signs, signs not big enough, no seat belts, not acting fast enough, not immediately jumping in and fishing her out, not phoning for an ambulance fast enough blah, blah, most, if not all but most contributing factors from the victims side, have been mostly glossed over or ignored.

So yeah, I'd say anything that even remotely suggests the victim was at fault, will not be received well.
 
Without knowing the details of what will be presented in the HSE findings I can't see any reason that Drayton should be punished (publically or financially). As long as there was appropriate signage stating that riders should stay seated and the boats were not defective, what reason could there be? Fair enough if the findings suggest that extra safety measures could/should be brought in in future to reduce the risk of something like this happening again (which Towers seem to have done voluntarily to some degree), but many parks in the world with these sorts of rides were running with them in the same manner so how was Drayton to know something like this would happen? Any punishment would be harsh in my opinion, but if something legitimately comes up in the findings that proves me wrong then I would be willing to change my opinion.
 
A child dies at somewhere that's supposed to be safe, it seems pretty normal to question whether more could have been done? Rather than put the family through headlines like "idiot child done herself in"?

It's one of them, was it a freak accident or a miracle it hasn't happened before? Like as far as I can tell it was a mad one in a trillion accident, and the ruling will probably go that way, with a small punishment and changes to the laws or recommendations to try to stop it happening again.

But all this "ooh they'll never blame the kid" stuff is weird and unhelpful. It's hardly like it's unprecedented for them to side with the rich/powerful/connected, is it? There's nothing to be gained from saying the park was fully at fault if they weren't.
 
Martin said:
A child dies at somewhere that's supposed to be safe, it seems pretty normal to question whether more could have been done?
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What more could have been done to avoid it? Well the School following the Government guidelines for such trips with that age group of kids would have prevented it totally from happening.

Two weeks before this happened I went on a school trip to a theme park, as park of their risk assessment we were all given strict instructions on what was allowed, one adult to every six students, and students were not allowed on specific rides (such as Rapids and large rollercoasters) unless accompanied by an adult in that ratio, I spent most of the day riding the Rollercoaster while another parent spent the day on the Rapids, at the time we scoffed at the reasoning behind it, as nerds it made no sense to us, it made sense a few week later.

There is plenty of blame to go around, but if you'd read any of the numerous articles on the subject, you'd be forgiven for thinking the park was considered to be 100% at fault.
 
At least on the surface it sounds like an all round terrible tragedy. A girl who went to have fun didn't come home. It must be devasating for her friends and family. I suspect a lot of people have been emotionally effected and will feel guilty in one way or another.

Presumably the HSE investigation looks at a lot of stuff which is why it takes so long. How many CCTV cameras are there? How good quality is the picture on the screens that the operator sees? Where are the E stops? How quickly do they work? If an operator's expected to concetrate on a load of CCTV screens, how long would they be operating the ride for at a time? How many hours a week were they working? Had anyone fallen in the water before? If they did, how was it investigated? What was the response? How good is the park's near miss reporting?

With any accident it's important to analyse any contributory factors behind it and try to learn any lessons to prevent similar accidents happening in the future. At the same time, unless there were factors that aren't public knowledge, then all of these things are quite subjective. It doesn't sound like there was any definititve thing that the park got wrong and I do get the impression that Drayton Manor generally takes health and safety seriously. They don't come across as a park that were riding their luck.
 
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