A 14-year-old boy died after falling from freefall ride at Orlando ICON Park

I saw this on another site, but this is pretty interesting. They were advertising the ride as having no weight limit according to this article from Orlando Sentinel. It is near the bottom of the article.

https://web.archive.org/web/20220108070736/https://www.orlandosenti...story.html

The way the restrictions are written into the manual it sounds like the manufacturer didn't really set a weight limit. The height requirement is spelled out as having been determined by TÜV in their report, while the weight limit is a call-out to EN 13814. But Funtime clearly intends for the determination of rider eligibility to be made based on the patron's ability to fit into the seat and be "adequately" restrained by the shoulder bar, and requires a minimum height to ensure compliance with TÜV. The implication here is that neither Funtime nor TÜV really cares about weight per se hence the owner does not list it among the ride restrictions.

--Dave Althoff, Jr.

The state has hired a forensic engineering company to investigate.

How common is that? I would expect that state inspectors would investigate? Maybe there is a conflict they are seeking to avoid in terms of having people who inspect/set state safety standards investigating an accident? Bring in an outside party who isn't conflicted?

I would think it is pretty uncommon. Ohio handled TTD.

At this point it's just a matter of who gets the finger pointed at them; park vs manufacturer.

Most likely they came across something in their initial investigation that they didn't understand/weren't qualified to interpret. So they bring in an Engineering Firm who can authoritatively review it and give them an answer.

I expect this isn't as uncommon as you may think. Especially where loss of life is concerned.

Interesting article here online.: https://www.clickorlando.com/news/local/2022/04/05/watch-live-attor...onference/ According to this source, "Seats of Orlando thrill ride where teen fatally fell were adjusted to fit larger patrons".

Obviously there's still a ton of litigation ahead, but who made this change and why could be quite interesting to follow.

The weight issue seems like a pretty big one. The manufacturer specified a weight limit, but it wasn't enforced. And this makes it sound like there was some modification to allow the restraint to be more open, which would be a pretty big liability to say it if it's not true. It will be interesting to see where the investigation lands, but no less sad that this poor kid died because of those failures.

Is it true that the ride manufacturer and operator are the same entity? I thought I read that somewhere.

I think you're correct. This ride and some others are located at ICON park, but aren't part of the park. They're owned and operated by a separate company. Not sure if the manufacturer is the day to day operator, or if they subcontract out to another company on their behalf.

wahoo skipper said:

Is it true that the ride manufacturer and operator are the same entity? I thought I read that somewhere.

The ride is operated by the SlingShot Group and the manufacturer is Funtime Thrill Rides based out of Austria. I do not know if they own the Slingshot Group. Also, the Skyfall in Germany that is operating has the tilting seats.

I'm a bigger guy, I weigh 315 and I'm 5'11, this kinda scares me. I would have trusted the ride if the ride gave the green light for me to ride it. I feel that could have been me. I have seen a lot of arguments online where people have used the well why did the operators let him ride if he wasn't able to ride the other ones. I'm glad I can come here and read information from people that have common sense because that isn't very common. Thank you all for contributing.

I rode a Skyfall drop tower at Munich’s Oktoberfest and if it’s the same one the seats did not tilt. What it did was rotate at the top for a nice long time, in a slow drizzle, at some unthinkable height for a portable ride. It was billed as the worlds tallest.
The Falcon ride at Busch Tampa was without a trace of doubt one of the scariest thrills I’ve ever experienced. As previously noted those seats pull back rather than tip forward and right themselves immediately once the carriage drops. I’m also a bigger guy, but in that one I felt locked in really well. The fact that this ride was allowed to operate the way it was is a horrible shame. I also wonder if I would’ve stood a chance of surviving that brake while leaning forward like that. I’ve noticed on several rides of various types that my restraint rests in a different position than those of the skinny guys, most women, and kids.
I’ll be in Orlando the last week of the month and I can guarantee you if it wasn’t for this accident and subsequently closure I would’ve gone over to ride this at least once, along with the sky flyer. Perhaps it’s a bullet dodged.

RCMAC, there is a permeant install at Hansa-Park that opened in 2019 and has the tilting seats.

Regarding weight: The manual is written very technically, and appears to target maintenance personal rather than operators. There is a weight limit in the manual, but

-the weight limit is listed on a separate page from the where the height requirement and a general statement regarding large riders is given. Why talk about some of the rider requirements in one place and then put the actual weight limit in another?

-the maximum weight was not on posted safety signage

-the weight in the manual is not converted to pounds

-the manual does not describe how to operators should confirm the riders weight. Are they supposed to ask riders? Weigh them? Guess their weight?

-the slingshot group communications guy said to local media at the ride’s grand opening event AND following the incident that there was not maximum weight, and to say that in press conferences both pre and post accident is very telling of his (and maybe everyone at slingshot’s) poor understanding of the documented procedures

Emergency preparedness: the manual said in an unusual situation to follow emergency procedures, but those were not listed in the manual. They might be on another document, but again you’d expect the materials to all be found in one location

911 call: On a transcribed 911 call the worker with the victim following the incident was asked by the dispatcher if there was an AED available, to which he replied there was not.. Which shocked me as this seems like a basic necessity in a large public venue. The dispatcher also asked the worker to roll the victim over and perform CPR which the worker replied he could not because Tyre was at least 300 pounds, which I found notable that he specified an estimated weight of the victim during the call which exceeded the maximum weight for the ride described in manual.

Operations themselves: If you watch the video it appears the operator closest to the camera is at the remote panel position, in front of the panel during dispatch. This suggests the ride is functioning in 1 person mode (overriding the remote panel) rather than 2 person which would require a button press agreement to dispatch. Since I have never worked on this particular ride I can’t be certain this was the remote panel, but maybe someone with more knowledge can confirm if it was?

seatbelts: I have seen over the shoulder harnesses fail before, and the redundant seatbelt managed to keep the hardness from opening fully. Although this is a different sort of incident than a harness pressure failure, the seatbelt could have helped as a secondary restraint, but as mentioned previously is often also used as a secondary restraint verification to confirm the harness is secured at an appropriate angle to act as a redundancy to the indicator lights.

OhioStater said:

My 10 year old had the following retort: "You would think they would test this ride with all sorts of dummies that have all different types of body shapes to see if any of them would fall out".

Makes sense.

Someone of this kid's size is not exactly unique.

Often times rides are tested with water dummies that are a fixed plastic shape, carried on and then filled with the water to add weight once placed in the seat. The dummies dimensions can be different and can be filled with different amounts of water for varied weights, although I wonder about the validity of this method because an individuals mass and fat is more squishy, like a water balloon, than it is fixed in place like a water bottle/water dummy.

Dummies are used for ballast, not to test for restraint function for various body shapes, etc. Dummies are used because with rides that no longer have enclosed gondolas, the only place to put ballast is in the seat, and the only way to secure that ballast in the seat is to use ballast that is vaguely person-shaped, since the seat is designed to secure person-shaped objects.

I think I noted previously that I think it's telling that while the minimum height requirement is called out as based on the TÜV report, the maximum weight is as specified in EN 13814. That combined with the instructions that the riders need to fit into the seat suggests that neither the manufacturer nor TÜV considered the rider's weight to be important considering the physical size limitations posed by the seat and restraint.

It's also worth noting that in accordance with ASTM F770-21a:5, it is the responsibility of the Owner/Operator to develop the inspection, maintenance, training, and operations programs for any ride, in accordance with information provided by the manufacturer per ASTM F2291-20:5.6.3. The manufacturer's manual is very technical in nature, and intended to give the Owner/Operator the information needed to develop the standard processes by which the ride is to be operated.

So now let's refocus the blame game.

The manufacturer built a ride that will green-light a rider who clearly should not be permitted to ride. But the manufacturer also specifies that the go/!go indicator is not to be used to determine rider eligibility, and explicitly states that any rider too large to fit in the seat should not be allowed to ride.

In that case, it appears that this was an operator failure, in that the operators did not insure that the rider was properly secure in accordance with the manufacturer's instructions.

But hold on a moment...what if the operators were doing exactly what they were trained to do? If they were trained to trust the automation on the ride, that means the problem isn't that the operators did anything wrong, but that the Owner/Operator developed an improper operating procedure and training program, ignoring specific instructions from the ride manufacturer.

The failure on this ride is pretty clear. Nothing went wrong with the ride, and subsequent inspection I am certain will find that to be the case. The ride is simply incapable of safely restraining a rider the size of Tyre, and nobody caught that fact until it was simply too late.

--Dave Althoff, Jr.

Remember when I suggested that maybe, perhaps, there was a modification made to the ride that somehow led to this?

Looks like there is a report that may validate that opinion

It looks like 2 seats were found to have MUCH larger openings than the rest.

Sure didn't take 'em long to screw around with it.

When I noticed that there was no standard listed for the maximum allowable restraint opening...something I would have expected TÜV to specify...I figured that the switches must be mounted in a non-adjustable manner on the seat. It turns out that there is quite a lot of adjustability in that switch, and when you consider it is located at the shoulder bar hinge, the effect of a small adjustment would result in quite a large change down at the seat pan.

Sigh. Looks like it's Rockin' Raceway (Zamperla Hawk) and SC State Fair (Technical Park Vortex) all over again.

--Dave Althoff, Jr.

Precisely, I was just discussing that with a ride inspector friend of mine. It seems that quite a number of people in this end of the industry agree with this observation.

Dave, that Vortex incident was at the NC fair. No matter, but that ride played Ohio earlier that season. I didn’t get on it and for some reason passed again in Raleigh. I wound up being glad about it.
I believe that gentleman is still sitting in jail over the infraction. I can’t imagine what goes through an operator’s head in deciding to override built in safety devices, and I’m especially curious about Orlando. You’d think that in this day and age with safety being an increased and quite visible priority…