Teenager dies in swing ride in France

I can't tell by the photos, but the structure doesn't look like a Skycoaster, and it's not in the Wikipedia list.

I wonder if this was built in-house. Unlike the recent Wisdom Music Express incident at Rye Playland, the articles out there don't mention any manufacturer information for this Skycoaster knock-off. Could also be a Chinese knock-off, but I am not 100% sure. I've been digging through ride manufacturer sites and haven't found anything. If someone else does, please post it as for some reason after reading Jeff's post, I am very curious as to who made this. Very sorry to hear what happened.

France makes their own knock-offs.

It’s only a Skycoaster if it comes from the production facility in Maryland. Otherwise it is just a sparkling swing.

There are a whole bunch of imitation Skycoasters in France. I imagine this to be one of them.

What f******* decided to make the two towers perfectly vertical?! Every other swing ride has an arch for completely obvious reasons.

What a senseless way to die.

Not sure what you're talking about. A good number of genuine Skycoaster rides have structures similar to that on the ride in question.

Look up the Skycoasters at Kennywood or Morey's Piers for just a few examples.

I think the design is OK, with the caveat of not operating it in high winds. It would take a big gust to blow a rider that far off centerline. Is there (public) documentation on Skycoaster's max wind speed for operations?

This doesn’t help it make sense, but I had seen another article that said it was a Slingshot type ride. I think it makes a little LESS sense actually that a gust of wind pushed them into one of the supports, as it always appears to me that the slingshots are pulled more taut between the two supports. I don’t know. In any case, this is horrific.

Skycoasters have a varying wind limit, with one limit where you are restricted to triple flyers only, then another where you must shut down.

Skycoaster attractions also have anemometers which will automatically alarm at certain wind speeds and disable the winch from raising.

I use to be a Site Controller for Skycoaster but I can't remember the wind cutoff. I keep thinking it was 15 mph but I don't know for sure. In my years working on Skycoasters, I never came across one that had a winch cutoff from the anemometer for wind speed. You as an operator just monitored the wind and closed when necessary. The attraction in the video from this incident is most definitely not a Skycoaster model. They do have a-frame versions but the legs still spread apart towards the bottom but none to my knowledge are complete vertical legs.

I think the wind speed may differ model to model depending on height.