Kansas lawmaker's son killed on world's largest water slide

Government regulation can't solve all problems, so we better make sure it doesn't solve any.

 

Every reputable amusement park has every ride inspected and signed off on, every morning, by a maintenance crew. They might not check every bolt in microscopic detail, but they do walk the track on roller coasters and know the rides well enough to check for trouble spots, and to notice if anything is amiss. There are also redundancies built in for safety systems. On roller coasters, for example, it's almost impossible for a car to fly off the track because there's 20 wheels under the train keeping it on track. When the power goes out with a train on the lift, there are mechanical devices that catch it and keep it from rolling backward.
If all that's keeping someone from a fun ride and being decapitated is a piece of wet, decaying velcro, the park needs to be shut down ASAP and sued into oblivion.

Schlitterbahn has five water parks. If Verrückt was a success in Kansas City, they're probably going to build one in their other parks (or sell them to other parks) in states where regulations might be tighter. That's not likely to happen if this thing isn't safe on a conceptual level. Pushing the envelope is good business. Decapitating your patrons is bad business.

Most accidents, too, are the fault of the rider. People doing dumb stuff they shouldn't be. It sounds like this ride might have been a little dicey in its conception and engineering, but keep in mind it did operate daily for two years without decapitating or severely injuring anyone (as far as we know). So what happened here to make things go so horribly wrong? What made this different than the hundreds of other rafts that went down the slide -- even some where the velcro straps came loose and didn't eject the riders?
There's some serious questions that need to be answered before blindly lashing out at the park owners, the ride itself, or the state of Kansas.

 

There was also a death at a water park in the East Bay about 30 years ago. It was hosting a senior class picnic and a large group dogpiled for the last ride of the day.

 

Yeah, the velcro mention jumped out at me as well. Plus the stories of past issues, the unexplained delays in the ride opening two years ago and why a 10-year-old was allowed to ride. One article I read mentioned there used to be a 14-year-old minimum, but apparently that was changed (or at least waived in this case).

 

I'm sure there's a state or federal regulator somewhere who: A) knew this was going to happen; B) knew exactly why this was going to happen; C) knew exactly how to prevent this from happening; but D) was stymied by some Ayn Rand type. [/starman]

 

Great movie pitch, doc. I'm in.

 

I read a quote somewhere that several of the rafts were duct taped in several places.

 

It's sad to think that we had a running thread about how California was America's first failed state, and then Kansas not only took a surprising lead, it lapped the field.

 

Louisiana has something to say about that and Alabama is closing hard in the clubhouse turn.

 

Yeah, the bolts were done this morning by some cranked-out carny, twitching and grinding his teeth.

I used to work at Disneyland. Knowing how they operate, I would go on any ride at a Disney park without a second's hesitation over safety.

I will not go on a ride at a carnival that I'm not willing to fly out of.

 

Velcro-type harnesses were likely used because of the (unlikely) chance of a raft flipping and trapping a rider underwater. Velcro is easy enough to rip apart in an emergency, like not drowning, and it's also easy for someone else to open up from almost any angle. Any type of more complicated buckle risks a person not being able to undo it while struggling underwater and takes a lot more concerted effort from a potential rescuer.

 

"In the unlikely event of a water landing ... "