Kings Island focuses on safety

I'm not entirely sure I like the overall tone of the story. I think it should be mentioned that top-notch maintenance and safety inspection has always been a top priority for Kings Island, that the park really has an exemplary record going back to well before the State of Ohio even did regulatory inspections. The way the story is written, it makes it sound like this is something new with the Cedar Fair ownership. In fact, that's one of the things that at least from a philosophical viewpoint hasn't changed much at all!

--Dave Althoff, Jr.

I agree Dave, I seen a news story on local 9 that had all the impressions that the park wasn't safe before just because of the SOB inccident which they excused the park as a design flaw.

It is always a parks best interest to operate and maintain as safely as possible.

What you "seen" is the linked story.

Agree entirely that the story makes it sound like Paramount considered safety merely an afterthought. Thank goodness for "9 on your side", educating us to the fact that CF considers safety to be of utmost importance.

In light of the accident at SFKK though, I suppose there is a somewhat newsworthy edge in that market. It's a stretch, I know.

"'Safety has been, is now, will always be our number one priority here,' said Helbig."I think the main idea of the story was looking at safety inspections of the rides before opening day due to the accident at SFKK, which that accident was mentioned at least twice. I got no impression from the article that the park was ever not safe.
*** This post was edited by Goliath Freak 4/30/2008 6:33:07 AM ***

See, that's the thing, it's all a touchy-feely kind of thing. They didn't say anything about the park's pre-Cedar Fair safety program. They merely stressed that safety is a high priority for Cedar Fair which could imply that it wasn't for Paramount or KECO. They didn't say it wasn't for Paramount or KECO, and Helbig did a good job of countering it, but the reporter almost did a better job of making it sound like the safety angle was actually a change in priority...when in fact, it wasn't.

In fact, in my own observations of Cedar Point and Kings Island, I've never seen either park do anything that would make me think they were running a ride that was not safe. But I have seen Cedar Point do things that were not "by the book" the likes of which I have never seen at Kings Island.

--Dave Althoff, Jr.

Like riding coaster train sideboards in the stations?

No, I haven't seen that since they added the computer to Blue Streak. I was thinking more in terms of swapping lift motors between coasters to save a CoasterMania ERT session; equipping a coaster with a diesel-powered air compressor to operate the brakes for a day or two; replacing a chain clutch stop block with a broom handle and a bit of gaffer's tape just to keep the clutch from banging against the bottom of a train for a couple of hours; running a major coaster in a maintenance mode because the automatic program was not functioning properly...those kinds of things. Ways of keeping the ride running that don't compromise safety, but that are also not 100% "by the book". I'm not saying those kinds of things never happened at Kings Island, but it always seemed less likely...

--Dave Althoff, Jr.