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Amusement Park ride tragedy 9

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Brian Malone

Brian Malone

Industrial
Jun 15, 2018
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A 14 year old was killed when he slipped out of the restraint harness on this free drop ride. He was a very large teen - more than 6 ft tall and about 340 lbs. From what I have seen in other stories, he exceeded the ride manufacturer's stated weight limit.

This looks like it may be a case of additive errors leading to a bad outcome:
1. It appears the over- shoulder restraint bar/harness did not have an interlock for ensuring proper latching before allowing the ride to function. Or if an interlock system exists, the interock did not work.
2. Ride operators did not check all rider's harnesses status prior to starting the ride.
3. The ride operator appears to have discounted the kid questioning why there was not any 'click'
4. The ride operator(s) either ignored the allowable weight limit for riders or were not trained to enforce the limit. Chances are there may not be a scale in the entry queue and the operators have to use a visual estimation of rider's weight.
5. Apparently the ride does not have seatbelts as a redundant safety measure. There appeared to be some questioning about a seatbelt.
6. The young man may have become anxious as the ride rose and he moved toward the front edge of the seat or pushed up on the restraint/harness in an attempt to ease his anxiety and thus changed his body angle and CG relationship, thus moving out of the cup of the seat. Anxious or not, by the very motion of the ride his body would react against the over- shoulder restraint bar/harness during the drop and if it has a rotation axis to ease entry and it was not locked it would be free to rotate and reorient the young man's body angle in relationship to the seat. Upon deceleration, the kid just slid out under the restraint.

The details are still unckear but this ride is a new construction so it will be interesting to see the failure report.
 
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I can imagine a relatively junior employee staffing the entry not wishing to get into an argument with a customer or their parents about their weight. As for not-checked harnesses...that will be hot water for everyone involved.
 
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I've been on rides like this anit looks like the primary restraint in the over the shoulder hinged pull down which normally has to get to a certain position before the ride will go. This is such that there isn't enough gap between the bottom of the restraint and the upstand between you legs. You also tend to sit down into the seat with your legs at a certain angle up.

One's I've been on also had a belt type clip which went from the middle of the crotch to the hinged down restraint to prevent the restraint lifting if accidentally released and also give you back up to prevent submarining.

Looks like this seat had that extra belt, but on the side?

This is what it looks like empty.

Screenshot_2022-03-30_093713_ancv69.jpg


I've also seen a blurry shot of the person on the ride and the restraint doesn't look locked in the down position to me. Basically his thighs were too big to allow the harness to go down to the same level as the others.

I've seen ride attendants bouncing up and down on them in the past to get them to click, nearly crushing the larger person in the seat so that they could get the green light.

I do feel for the kids being put in positions of doing this hundreds of times a day and having arguments with someone who is just too big for the seat, or marginally so. But the safety features on the ride shouldn't allow it to go unless locked down sufficiently. Maybe they need a couple of extra large seats on these rides to prevent this, but then you don't want a skinny person in them either....

If you watch this video of a previous ride - go to about 8:30 and you discover the seat TILTS FORWARD at the top! Looking a the person next to the person filming you can't see where the belt is, but it doesn't look the best fit of a "normal" sized person.
Wouldn't be surprised if it comes out that there have been a few near misses before.

Remember - More details = better answers
Also: If you get a response it's polite to respond to it.
 
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When you go back to this horrific incident
You find that the regulation of rides is rather haphazard. This is a comparison of states
FL is actually not that bad - but note that only 9 states require operators to be >18 and FL isn't one of them.

This organisation spells it out really well
It was that discovery not mentioned on the news channels that the seats tip forward at the top is truly one of the swiss cheese holes as it puts the force much more on the restraint than literally the seat of your pants.

I've been on one or two of these drop fall rides, but nothing as tall as that one and the force after your 2 or more seconds of "free fall" is really significant. I could easily believe 2G.

Remember - More details = better answers
Also: If you get a response it's polite to respond to it.
 
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I understand the inspection issue, as there likely are no people at the state level that are qualified at every ride. And the exception for permanent rides is that in many cases when rides are taken apart and moved, the reassembly allows for the assembly person to take short cuts, like not installing more than half the bolts.
But that said, the insurance company should require an inspection by a qualified person, similar to boiler inspectors.
In some rides, the restraint bar is common for several riders, and in that case maybe a common scale can be used, but in this case it sounds like a single person scale should be available.

When I was taking my daughter to the fair, I would notice empty bolt holes, and I would see seats taped off and marked as bad. This was most concerning as a parent.
 
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Wow - the seats tilt forward for the drop! Obviously this really increses the 'falling' sensation and would be a plus for someone properly restrained but for a rider not locked this would reduce the restraining force provided by the cup of the seat. As others have pointed out - the ride operators are often older teens or near-twenties and working in an environment that is noisy, repetitious, distracting and fraught with pressure to maximize throughput while minimizing conflict with riders - this tragedy has probably been a near miss on many occasions. The engineering challenges of the over- shoulder restraint system is challenging:
1. Accommodation of many body shapes and sizes
2. Restraint force sufficient for a very wide range of potential load cases but not so high to cause injury to the rider
3. The lock/ latch indicator must discern a proper latch condition even in a condition of possible 'spring back' of the restraint against the rider
4. The latch must not be prone to jamming to prevent ease of unlatching
5. Latch mechanism preferably would facilitate efficient ride throughput
6. Latch mechanism preferably would require minimal effort by the ride operator
7. Latch lock/ indicator system would /should be able to survive thousands of make/break cycles

The mechanical challenges are daunting, then throw in the human interaction and the true scope of the design and operation of these amusements is evident. Having a seatbelt definitely would be a major mitigation for much of the inherent risk.
 
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Apparently he was refused a ride on several other rides that day due to his size, but this ride let him on when it doesn't have any other straps or harnesses other than the pull down shoulder ones.

Remember - More details = better answers
Also: If you get a response it's polite to respond to it.
 
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I find it hard to believe the seat tips forward enough to dump someone out at 400' above the ground and the only safety is some kind of locking mechanism at the upper pivot of the over the shoulder restraint. I wouldn't want anything to do with such a design.
 
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It's absolutely astonishing that no testing exposed this design flaw. I question whether these over the shoulder systems were even intended for use in this orientation.
 
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The design appears to work for typical "kids". This kid was a lot bigger. But that would mean he filled the restraint more than typical kids. And that should have meant he would have less chance of falling out.

So it appears that the problem isn't with "over the shoulder systems". It looks more like failure in the latching and interlocks:

If the latch latches, then the shoulder restraint will keep a larger person in.

If the latch does not latch, then an interlock will not allow the ride to function. Once the failure to latch is fixed, the interlock allows the ride to function.

There's likely more to it, but that looks like the main concept.



spsalso
 
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The FMEA used by the amusement ride fabrication company must be somewhat ad hoc and mitigation for failure of the restraint systems was low on the list of piorities - if the clickorlando.com news story is true, the gneral manager of the fabrication company strongly pushed for no seatbelts:

New records released by the FDACS show that the General Manager of Funtime Thrill Rides, Hannes Lackner, advocated for no seat belts on Orlando FreeFall.

“The seat and shoulder restraint system…has 2 independent locking devices, and the shoulder restraints are monitored. It is no need for an extra safety or seat belt because the seat and restrain system fulfill more than the requirements,” Lackner wrote in a letter attached to the ride’s user manual.

If Mr. Lackner's opinion was the last say on safety systems of the ride or if he strongly swayed the decision of the FMEA review team, the oversight of a rdundancy to the over-shoulder restraint is rather ominous.

It is still not clear to me if the rider was so large that the restraint was able to latch and indicate a latched condition but its structure/support was deflected such that the rider was able to slide from under the restraint and over/around the between-the-legs upriser or was the restraint in a partial latched condition and the indicator falsely showed a latched condition. After the rider slid out the restraint fully latched itself and thus its condition when the ride was checked after it was lowered and stopped? For the kid to have slid over the upriser while squeezed by the restraint must have been painful or injurious or the restraint wasn't restraining.
 
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The 'kid' was bigger than most adults... [ponder]

Rather than think climate change and the corona virus as science, think of it as the wrath of God. Do you feel any better?

-Dik
 
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Or maybe the requirement for someone supervising the ride be older than 18 (or more)? Funny that it would happen in Florida... do they have a minimum age?

Rather than think climate change and the corona virus as science, think of it as the wrath of God. Do you feel any better?

-Dik
 
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The actual operator's manual for the ride was posted by the State of Florida, along with inspection records and other things, here:
I read through most of it and there are supposedly numerous sensors all over the ride including two for each seat that will not let the ride run unless the harness is locked. The claim is that the harness was actually locked. As someone above said, did the harness lock itself AFTER the kid fell out? This ride has a ton of monitoring via PLCs including a separate dedicated "safety PLC." I wonder how much logging those PLCs do. The manuals don't seem to mention much about logging other than error logs... Would be nice to know "Seat 5 latch 1 locked at 3/27/22 15:03:05"
 
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The other potential weak spot for this operation is the lower up riser which prevents people sliding out under the harness or between the upriser and the base of the over shoulder harness.

The unfortunate victim was above the weight limit for the ride and they also usually have other parameters like chest size and maybe thigh girth.

Kind of difficult to measure those in a theme park setting, but they are there.

I've seen dummy seats in the queue line to allow people to see if they fit - not sure if they do that there?

Remember - More details = better answers
Also: If you get a response it's polite to respond to it.
 
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my similear thoughts. . .

given young mans height and chest girth, the between the leg protrusion was left far above the seat, (and the thickness of hips had his CG over the edge of the seat)

the over the shoulder did restrain during negative G of initial fail, but during positive G deceleration, he submarined out of the seat/restraint.

given knowledge of the basic forces of fall/decel AND with fall protection harness I wouldn't get on that ride with out at least a 5 point harness


there is NO way a teenage operator could begin to grasp the consequenses of devetations of outside the limit riders
 
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