Witness says ride operators at fault in Six Flags New England death

LOL, I understood what Kevin was saying but I had to read it a few times. Yes, wahoo, I know I contradicted myself several times (WAY to early ;)), but the point I was trying to make is that in my opinion, while legally it may be all on the park I think the guy should have noticed something wasn't right and spoke up and/or fixed/tried to fix the lapbar situation himself. I was merely comparing what I personally would have done to what he did or didn't do.

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Letro said, "They hire summer workers, mostly untrained kids, and the plan is to move as many passengers through the turnstile as possible."

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He's obviously not been to many Six Flags parks. Capacity is rarely a priority.

My personal guess is that whatever training they actually do, they don't communicate just how serious their jobs are. People that have been through training at Cedar Point tell me they beat that into you above all other things, and it comes through at times with ride ops being a bit over-zealous at times. That's an extreme opposite to the general indifference I've experienced at some of the Six Flags parks.

Needless tragedy.

No matter how much training you do...people will still make mistakes or be ignorant. That isn't to say that Six Flags does or doesn't do enough. When I worked for Disney I had a solid week of training before I ever took my first Jungle Cruise boat out on my own. For a few hours we went backstage and did nothing but practice using the guns (which are no longer on the boats). It was presented to us as "do whatever you want with these guns now because once you are on the attraction there is only X you can do with them." Of course, even after all of that excellent Disney training it still comes down to choices individuals make.

One guy pretended to shoot himself in the head. He figured, hey, it's just blanks...they can't hurt me. Turns out that a small burst of heat and flame still shoots out of a gun with a blank bullet and he burned himself pretty bad. The doctor said he was lucky it didn't kill him. That, of course, wasn't Disney's fault.

What Rampage was *getting at*, I think, is that while the park may be found LIABLE for the man's death, the man isn't coming back to life....that's why I *always* check my OWN restraints. It's MY life on the line, NOT that of the ride op (who's safely in the station while I'm on a machine with enormous weight and high speeds).

While it is entirely possible that this was the ride operators fault, it just doesn't seem right to me. So far this season i've gotten 8 or 9 laps on SFNE's SROS, and each time the ride op's were very thorough when checking the restraints. My seatbelt was pulled on, and my lapbar had been pushed down on each and every ride that I had.

Granted I didnt like being stapled in like I was but they were doing there jobs on my visits.

Rides 911 is reporting that nobody checked the victims side of the train and that the on ride photo shows that the Victim's lap bar was not down. Interesting.

http://members.aol.com/rides911/accidents.htm

A couple of points to add:

The lap bar will not come down on its own during the ride. There is no down force on it great enough to lower it.

The operators at S:ROS are definitely not concerned with efficiency. They seldom do anything quickly or efficiently anywhere at SFNE! Last weekend S:ROS was operating with one train, as it has all year while the red train is being serviced for the season. They were certainly not being rushed by a train in cue, or anything else other than the passengers.

In all the rides I've taken on superman (maybe 80+ realistically), I've never seen them skip their seats checks. It's like a basic routine. They check the seats, then go to their "arming" stations (I dont know the official term for them), where they press a button and give a thumbs up to dispatch the train. The theory that because they got out of routine because of a seat swap may make sense. Usually there are two seat checkers per side. One in front, one in back. Perhaps the one in front dealing with mordarsky thought the rear checker was covering the other front seats, which would explain why the preachers daughter wasn't checked. In another thread someone cited a reliable source had told him that the belt had not fit around Mordarsky, but the operator allowed him to ride. This may be true, and perhaps explain how he got in the front seat. If he'd started in the second row of the first train, the operator would have moved him to the front row because the belts have a little more slack in the non tiered front rows. If after getting 4 people moved around and then finding the belt still didn't fit, they may have let him ride with just the T-Bar. Bad move for sure, but a possible explaination to all this mystery.

wahoo -

I am NOT blindly defending any park, or anyone, nor am I squarely placing blame. I am simply asking why it is entirely the PARK's responsibility, other than the fact that they're the ones with the deepest pockets and can be sued for the most.

I haven't been following this *too* closely, but what I have picked up on was that there were a multitude of checks that failed, both due to the park, the rider himself and other people who maybe should be concerned for the safety of another human (or is that too much to ask). The man should have known his limitations, as he was turned away from the ride before. The man should have known how to operate his own safety restraint, or had someone with him to explain it to him if he was incapable of this (something I find incredible if he's already ridden many other coasters). The man should have self-checked his restraint, as everyone should, and not put your life 100% in the care of a mechanical systme and a ride op you don't even know. The woman who noticed his restraint loose should have notifeid someone upon exiting the station. The people in line who might have noticed his restraint go unchecked and unfastened should have notified someone. The ride itself should maybe have an electronic stop checking to see that all the restraints are at least past a certain point. The ride ops should have checked the man's bar. The ops watching the train leave the station should have noticed a bar that was not properly secured.

So right there are 9 different checks which all failed in thise case. Three are marginally attributable to the park, two about ops, one about the ride. One is attributable to Intamin (the electronic signal check).

Tell me again how it's completely the park's fault that this man was ejected from the ride?

How is it possible that this guy didn't fly out of the coaster till almost the end of the ride? I have no idea what the layout of this ride is like, but typically at the end of a coaster the speed is drastically lower and the forces much less significant than the they are during the previous sections of the ride.

Hi All,

Isn't it interesting how pretty much all of us on here have been careful to add that our viewpoints are speculation, pending the final report (even when witness reports indicate that the rider was not secured properly by the ops). However, WOKR have their own ideas!

"Six Flags Takes Precautions On Dangerous Ride"

I'd be pretty pis*ed off at that headline if I were in the management team at 6 flags!

"Tell me again how it's completely the park's fault that this man was ejected from the ride?"

IF the witness' statement is reliable (IF no checks were done)...

Should have the victim checked his own restraints? Sure. Personally, I always do. I make sure all belts are tight and that all restraints can't fly open before the ops check me. I want to make sure I am safe.

HOWEVER... it is the job of the ops to check the riders. IF this account is in fact true, they did not do that job. Had they done that job, there would not have been an accident and we would not be sitting here talking about it right now.

IF in fact they did let him ride while knowing the belt was open (they say he had already swithced seats)... this is gross negligence.

True, the ride can be run with open restraints. Because of that, all the more reason for the ops to make sure that they are properly being used BEFORE dispatching the train.

Bottom line... if this is in fact what happened... the rider was guilty of not using common sense in checking for himself... but the ops were guilty of not doing a very important part of their jobs.

That's exactly what I was *getting at* gator.

SFNE Fanatic, I could have sworn that SFA's Superman stapled me at the bottom of the first drop. I may be wrong, but I do remember barely being able to move from the drop until the brakes.

I agree jdancisin. I've seen the layout of the ride and heard tons of talk about the airtime on it. I also find it hard to believe that he didn't fall out until the end. If the laprbar was up, then he had to be doing some serious holding on through out the ride.

The fact that he fell out on a banked turn at the end, where the center of gravity is under you, is pretty odd. You'd have to be leaning out in addition to your restraint being open to come out of the train I would think.

Jeff-
You may be right. Unfortunately, his physical condition means he had trouble controling body movements. Compound that with a open restraint and tragedy follows. A very sad day.

Well I am glad to see that I wasn't the only one wondering how he didn't fall out until the very end. The airtime and the fast sharp turns on this ride would make it very difficult for a person of his ability to hold on all through the ride, only to fly out in the end. The only thing that I could think of is that he held on during the parts where he realized he needed to, but then let up on "holding on" during that last turn. Either way, it's a horrible tragedy regardless of who is at fault.

On a related note, channel 2 news in Baltimore is doing an "expose" piece on coaster safety tonight at 11 for those that are interested. I am sure this story was prompted by this incident and the fact that SFA's S:RoS using the same restraints.

Sean

When you are riding a Skycoaster, is it your responsibility to make sure your harness is secure or the ride operators'? I ask this because on a Skycoaster the position you end up in makes it impossible to tell if your harness is secure or not. Would you even know what steps you would have to take to hook up to a Skycoaster restraint? All of the responsibility falls to the operator who is hooking you up.

On a stand-up coaster is it your responsibility to see if the "seat" is at the proper level or does the operator check out each seat to make sure they are at the appropriate position? The responsibility falls to the operator.

When a child gets onto a kiddie coaster is it the responsibility of the parent to make sure the child is secured or the ride operator? The responsibility falls to the operator.

In all of these cases, the ultimate responsibility before giving the go ahead and releasing the train or activating the ride falls to the ride operator. Sure, I double check my restraint and my seatbelt b/c I have ridden coasters hundreds of times. But, that doesn't mean I can say to the operator..."don't worry about me...I'm secure. Go on to the next person." The operator still must check my restraints.

On employee ride nights the ride operator still checks the restraints, at least in respectable parks.

Now, I would agree that there is always room for contributory negligence. Maybe the rider did somehow lean out too much which futher aided the ejection. But, I suspect if he were restrained properly in the first place he wouldn't have had the option of leaning out too far...at least that is the way it seems to be headed. The park has a certain duty of care. They must get you in the ride properly. You have a certain duty of care. You must not tamper with the restraints.

By the way freakylick; it is the beginning of the season and it is sweeps week. A "are parks safe" newspiece this time of year is as sure a thing as admission increases.

*** This post was edited by wahoo skipper 5/6/2004 1:29:28 PM ***

If they do find that the ride op was to blame, I wonder what will happen to Six Flags? The last thing they need right now is to loose a law suit like this.

I don't personally feel that the ride op is 100% responsible for rider's safety. Especially for larger persons, it is too easy to make lap bars look like they are all the way down when they are not. They can push out their gut and not sit back all the way. If this guy was an enthusiast with plenty of experience, I find it hard to believe that he did not know he could and should push his bar down further. He chose to ride with it at that level. Maybe it was so obvious that the ride op should have caught it, or maybe he was slick. But either way, he could have rode safely if he wanted to.

Coasters always have signs and audio telling you how to secure yourself. If you do not listen, that is your fault. It is nice that they double check that the restraints are working properly, but you should be able to ride safely even if they don't. I have been to small parks where they do not always check, and I never fear for my life.

Please correct me if I'm wrong, but from the picture I saw the bank back into the station at SFNE is similar to the bank that S:ROS @ SFA takes at the bottom of the first drop, am I correct? If so, I also know when you are in the front row, right seat you are parallel with the ground. It is a big difference from being in the front row left seat. You do have the sensation you are going to fall out. I know countless people that have ridden with me, in that seat, that descend the lift hill with their hands up, but very quickly grab the restraint when they hit that turn.

RavenTTD:

If in the future you would ever get a job "in the industry" and would be responsible for park safety or even for that matter as simply an operator, PLEASE post it on this board. After reading that last paragraph, I want to STAY AS FAR AWAY AS POSSIBLE.

Didn't the man have cerebal palsy? I have no idea what the condition is like, but maybe it had something to do with him not securing his own restraint (which isn't his responsibility!). Anyway, quit criticizing his "common sense". It is the responsibility of the ride-ops to make sure you are secured because they know how the mechanisms work. If this is indeed the case then it is absolutey outrageous that something like this could have happened. It really is a shame.