April 15, 2009
Recently the Florida Department of Agriculture, Bureau of Fair Rides issued their report concerning an incident on February 5, 2009 involving the “Avalanche” amusement ride located at the Collier County Fair. A young woman was ejected/thrown from the ride during the operation of the ride. The injured woman was transported by ambulance to a local hospital where she was treated for her injuries. Her status is not known however from the Bureau of Fair Rides Report the potential existed for life threatening injuries.
A subsequent investigation was conducted by the Bureau of Fair Rides and the manufacturer of the “Avalanche” amusement ride. The Bureau of Fair Rides report indicates that the ride was functioning properly. The manufacturer reports that they found the ride to be operating faster than recommended by the Operations Manual and at least one of the individual seat restraint latching was not operating properly. However a secondary device was operating properly at that time. Further investigation revealed other intermittent problems.
This particular “Avalanche” amusement ride has been the subject of several other patron ejections dating back to almost ten years. The restraint system is set up to have a redundant back-up. However that system must checked and tested as well.
The owner/operator of the “Avalanche” amusement ride went as far as to install a crotch strap that ensures the restraint is held down in place. This was done with the permission of the “Avalanche” manufacturer. Additional the Ride Manufacturer issued a Bulletin requiring Owner/Operators of “Avalanche” amusement rides to check the speed and if a ride is found to be operating outside the parameters established by the manufacturer you should make repairs as necessary.
There are some things that I do not understand about this particular incident. The Manufacture requires that the revolutions per minute (RPM) be checked on the ride. Anyone who has ever ridden an amusement ride knows that the motion of the amusement ride is what makes it fun. Spinning too slow can be boring and spinning too fast can have fatal consequences. Yet the Bureau of Fair Rides and the Ride Owner/Operator have no indication that the RPM’s were ever were ever counted, checked, recorded or otherwise observed anywhere in the report.
This particular amusement ride has both positive and negative forces and is very dependant on knowing what the forces and the amount of force is. That is why it has the restraint system with redundancy and why it is necessary to follow the manufacturer’s guidelines in the repair and maintenance of the amusement ride.
There are several other things in the official report that stand out. They pale in comparison to the ones I have mentioned.
A quick overview of the amusement ride industry shows at best it is a patchwork of regulations and very little in any information sharing on a regular basis. The industry tends to be reactive as opposed to proactive. Incident, statistic and tracking systems are non existent on a nationwide basis. For all intents and purposes the amusement ride industry is self regulated by the same people who manufacture, design, own and operate the amusement rides. Government involvement is minimal at best and then they are using the industry’s own self regulation as an enforcement tool. Talk about the fox guarding the hen house.
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