• Alton Towers crash victim has leg amputated
    54 replies, posted
[QUOTE=gt118;47906979]why would god let this happen?[/QUOTE] 1:13 ? [media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PGAFLK95EgQ[/media]
Eh, however they handle the ride itself later, I just hope she, and all others involved in the crash, get proper monetary justice. She deserves a lot for having her life irrecoverably altered.
[QUOTE=revan740;47910864]Eh, however they handle the ride itself later, I just hope she, and all others involved in the crash, get proper monetary justice. She deserves a lot for having her life irrecoverably altered.[/QUOTE] On the other hand, she might get a kickass new robot leg for free.
[QUOTE=GeneralSpecific;47911279]On the other hand, she might get a kickass new robot leg for free.[/QUOTE] She's 17. She's lives in a time where this is quite possible for her.
[QUOTE=revan740;47910864]Eh, however they handle the ride itself later, I just hope she, and all others involved in the crash, get proper monetary justice. She deserves a lot for having her life irrecoverably altered.[/QUOTE] Apparently Merlin Entertainment (the company that owns the park) have already reached out to the victims to offer and provide care. So that's a good start I guess.
Here's a bunch more speculation as to what happened, in more detail: [quote=TowersTimes]Speculation disclaimer! So based on the speculation so far in this thread, here is a summary of all the speculation and eye witness accounts, including the multiple points of failure likely to have occurred. With so many possible points of failure leading to the collision, you can understand why it has been described by Varney as a "unique circumstance". The sequence of events below have differing reliability when it comes to sources, some facts are near certain, while others are only according to a few eye witness accounts. -"The 16" board a Smiler car during normal operation. A ride shutdown occurs for an unknown reason and they must leave the car and wait on the platform. -During the shut down, a new car is introduced. It is possible the shut down was simply to introduce this new car, or maybe another routine reason. -Several cars are cycled around the track empty during the shutdown. -The last car to be cycled around the track empty is the newly introduced car. -Failure point 1: The new car is sent around empty without weighted dummys. As it's wheels are cold this increases the chance of a stall. It is not clear what the regular procedure is for introducing a new car during normal operation, a fact which has not been discussed in this thread. We know water dummys are used in the morning, but when a new car is introduced during regular operation, is the normal procedure to send it empty, with dummys, or with passengers for its first circuit? The answer to this question will determine if this is a failure to follow procedure by staff, or a case of inadequate procedure. -Following the new car being sent around empty, the ride is declared back in operation. -The next car is loaded with "The 16" passengers again. At this time it is not clear whether loading began before the stall, or after the stall. In theory, the car destined to stall could have still been on the lift, or approaching the batwing at the time loading first began. As the ride is a multi-car multi-block system, it will be normal to load a car while an empty car still goes around. Speculation about why the empty car wasn't allowed to come back to the station first is meaningless, as it is normal for the Smiler to have multiple cars out on the circuit. 5 cars don't all fit in the station at once! -It is likely that the loaded car was dispatched before news reached the console of the stalled train. By this time the empty car had probably already stalled. The time margins would have been tight, and news of the stall almost certainly wouldn't have reached the console yet, or they wouldn't have dispatched a loaded train. -Failure Point 2: A car stalled. This is a clear point of failure in itself. The stall occurred on a stretch of track notorious for stalls. Even with a safe block system, a stall during normal operation is a disaster, and would have resulted in days of shutdown. -Failure Point 3: A car is dispatched full of passengers with a stalled train on the circuit. It all likelyhood there is little which could have been done about this, unless the ride op is looking at the correct CCTV view at the moment of dispatching the train. Communication of the stalled train may have taken a minute or two to reach the console, at best. This isn't even a complete failure, as the block system should prevent collision. -The loaded car now makes it journey towards the lift hill, with the empty stalled car in the batwing. -The loaded car correctly stops at the top of lift hill, the only reason to stop in this position in normal operation is because the next block section hasn't been cleared, or because of an estop. Either situation is possible, as we do not know what was going on in the console at this time. We do not know if they had spotted the stalled car or not at this point. -Somewhere between 5 and 15 minutes pass, as described by multiple eye witnesses including those on the car, where the loaded car stops at the top of the lift hill. -After this time has passed, the lift hill starts to move again, and the occupied car moves into the same block section as the stalled car. At this point a collision is unstoppable. -The collision occurs. -Failure point 4: A car moves into the occupied block section of track, leading to the collision. This is clearly the most hotly disputed part of the story, as several circumstances could have led to this scenario, all of which are still speculation at this point. No one has enough knowledge in the media, and even in this thread very little, of how the ride system work for us to be sure what happened. Here are some of the suggested failure points, for failure 4: -News of the stall still hadn't reached the console, and system is reset and car dispatched by engineer/ride op. -New car on the track causing confusion of number of trains that should be in the system, similar to cause above. -Stall is noted, and engineer tries to bring loaded car back down the lifthill, but sends the lifthill in the wrong direction. -Block is somehow incorrectly marked as cleared due to system failure, or the proximity sensors being incorrectly set off at the bottom of lift hill 2. -The lift hill is manually switched on for some other reason. -The block section is marked as cleared manually for some other reason. All the best to those recovering from injuries. Typing this all up have made the events clearer in my mind, hope it helps someone else understand too. Speculation disclaimer![/quote]
[QUOTE=redBadger;47912039]She's 17. She's lives in a time where this is quite possible for her.[/QUOTE] It depends if the amputation is above or below the knee. If it's below the knee yeah fair enough prosthetics are no biggie, if it's above it's a lot more awkward
[QUOTE=Shibbey;47913764]It depends if the amputation is above or below the knee. If it's below the knee yeah fair enough prosthetics are no biggie, if it's above it's a lot more awkward[/QUOTE] [quote=article]Her leg was amputated above the left knee and she also suffered a fractured left hand.[/quote]
[QUOTE=alien_guy;47907038]I don't understand why you can have more than one carriage on the track at one time. if you need to test you can just use the normal one, just without any people on it.[/QUOTE] my dad spent 25 years as the primary electronics and maintenance supervisor at a Six Flags park, I've practically lived in the core of what makes these parks run smoothly. Having three 'trains' on a rollercoaster track is extremely common. You've got one loading passengers, one nearing the end of the ride and taxiing into the loading area, and another just starting off the ride. In the 2-4 minutes it takes for a single train to get through the entire ride, you've unloaded, loaded, and sent off a new train. There's no "throw them all out on the track at once!" situations, and if there's an emergency, there are a handful of locations that are [i]mandatory[/i] on modern rides that have a strip of brakepads. This is used to regulate the train's speed, and more importantly, stop the train if there's a malfunction somewhere along the line. looking into this recent incident, it appears an empty train was let off onto the track. I'm not sure what on earth could have caused that, especially if the coaster had been running fine throughout the day. I can only imagine someone switched over the maintenance track (or it was caused by a system malfunction) and there happened to be a train sitting idle on the separate segment. Can't find whether the empty train had rolled out onto a separate segment of track or not. My only other guess could be that they ran an empty train in the morning/for a maintenance check and some twit completely forgot there was another cart sent out, and it stalled on the 'batwing' segment, which has apparently seen [url=http://old.towerstimes.co.uk/news/news.php?subaction=showfull&id=1370862903&archive&start_from&ucat=1%2C10%2C117]several[/url] malfunctions before. Then the injured riders were the first riders of the day/after the maintenance cycle. Would make sense, given two of the three incidents were pre-open tests with no occupants or only some weighted dummies.
[QUOTE=Noss;47907116]The way the company is handling this is absolutely disgusting, and I can't believe that they have the audacity to open the park after just 6 days. Looking on their homepage, there is no visible public apology, or even an acknowledgement of the events that transpired. The park should be shut down for a far longer period in order to perform a full review of their staff training, their emergency procedures, and the safety of their rides. Furthermore, they should be massively compensating those who were involved, but I have a feeling that they will need to go to court in order to claim the compensation that they deserve.[/QUOTE] There is no way on earth any company having a tragic accident happen on their behalf would just shut down for a year to investigate everything and put extreme focus on the incident. They might as well just go out of business because that is exactly what would happen. Not saying they are doing an amazing job or anything now but lets be real here. Shutting down for a year? Why not just shut down permanently at that point? Who would seriously do that because of an accident that is largely due to only a single ride? They should keep the park open, apologize, shut down the ride for good and just in general do good will towards victims.
[QUOTE=Starlight 456;47907573]Airlines and amusement parks aren't at all comparable.[/quote] Nah, they're not. You're totally right. 747s falling on cities doesn't kill thousands of people, right? A roller coaster malfunctions the death toll is at worse a handful of people. It's incredibly rare for anyone to die on a coaster and nine times out of ten it's because of a pre-existing medical condition that made them too sensitive to high G-forces. Contrarily, if a single commercial aircraft goes down you've lost a couple hundred [i]just from those on board the aircraft[/i]. If it lands in a populated area you could be losing tens of thousands of people. Maybe hundreds of thousands if it happens to land at the right spot...like, say, a really big sporting event. Daytona 500 comes to mind, World Series, Superbowl, stuff like that. Yet the airlines don't have to stop every flight in their roster if one of their jets encounters rapid unplanned disassembly. The authorities can and do investigate those without demanding a total grounding of the entire fleet operated by that company for an entirely abritrary reason, so why should we demand an entire theme park be shut down because of one accident on one ride? It doesn't make any damn sense. Close the ride in question(Which they've done) and let the park operate normally otherwise(which they've done). American Airlines doesn't get grounded if one of their jets crash. Amtrak doesn't get shut down if one of their trains derails. Greyhound doesn't get shuttered if one of their buses flips. You don't shut down the local power company if a transformer explodes and you don't close the valves on the water company because a water main burst somewhere. No, the rest of these operations continues to function unless there's an actual need to shut the entire bloody thing down. There's no need to forcibly close the entire theme park because of a singular freak accident on a singular ride. Yes, it's a horrible accident and it needs to be investigated, but you don't need to close the whole fuckin' park to do that. The ride in question? Yes. Shut that down. But not the whole park.
I think the park has handled this rather well: [quote]"We have recommended each of the injured guests or their families instruct a lawyer and submit a claim for compensation which we will ensure is dealt with swiftly and sensitively."[/quote] The fact they are outright oweing up to responsibility and wanting to help the victims, as opposed to how many companies simply say 'we refuse to comment' or 'it is our utmost priority to keep our guests safe' instead.
[QUOTE=nuttyboffin;47915232]I think the park has handled this rather well: The fact they are outright oweing up to responsibility and wanting to help the victims, as opposed to how many companies simply say 'we refuse to comment' or 'it is our utmost priority to keep our guests safe' instead.[/QUOTE] It is a good move, but to be honest I cannot see it being anyone else's fault other than the park so really they are just speeding up the inevitable. Its quite an admirable thing, a lot of companies would drag something like this through the courts before they got anywhere near to paying out compensation or assistance. Its even more impressive when you realise that the park is owned by an investment company, the last people you would expect to admit liability straight away.
[QUOTE=dai;47914868]my dad spent 25 years as the primary electronics and maintenance supervisor at a Six Flags park, I've practically lived in the core of what makes these parks run smoothly. Having three 'trains' on a rollercoaster track is extremely common. You've got one loading passengers, one nearing the end of the ride and taxiing into the loading area, and another just starting off the ride. In the 2-4 minutes it takes for a single train to get through the entire ride, you've unloaded, loaded, and sent off a new train. There's no "throw them all out on the track at once!" situations, and if there's an emergency, there are a handful of locations that are [i]mandatory[/i] on modern rides that have a strip of brakepads. This is used to regulate the train's speed, and more importantly, stop the train if there's a malfunction somewhere along the line. looking into this recent incident, it appears an empty train was let off onto the track. I'm not sure what on earth could have caused that, especially if the coaster had been running fine throughout the day. I can only imagine someone switched over the maintenance track (or it was caused by a system malfunction) and there happened to be a train sitting idle on the separate segment. Can't find whether the empty train had rolled out onto a separate segment of track or not. My only other guess could be that they ran an empty train in the morning/for a maintenance check and some twit completely forgot there was another cart sent out, and it stalled on the 'batwing' segment, which has apparently seen [url=http://old.towerstimes.co.uk/news/news.php?subaction=showfull&id=1370862903&archive&start_from&ucat=1%2C10%2C117]several[/url] malfunctions before. Then the injured riders were the first riders of the day/after the maintenance cycle. Would make sense, given two of the three incidents were pre-open tests with no occupants or only some weighted dummies.[/QUOTE] IIRC they had technical issues with the coaster in the morning that day, so they sent an empty test car around. It never came back, must have gotten stuck. And whoever was in charge sent the car with people out anyway. Then the system that stops more than one car being on the same section of track failed and it slammed into the back of the empty car at about 60mph.
[QUOTE=RainbowStalin;47915421]IIRC they had technical issues with the coaster in the morning that day, so they sent an empty test car around. It never came back, must have gotten stuck. And whoever was in charge sent the car with people out anyway. Then the system that stops more than one car being on the same section of track failed and it slammed into the back of the empty car at about 60mph.[/QUOTE] the few sources I found earlier said the train was going 20mph on impact. 60 is like, max speed for most, and that's usually just on the initial drop. You wouldn't be doing that around the rest of the track, let alone a segment where the trains could be going slow enough to stall and roll back to a neutral position (bottom of a curve) all in all that situation is fucked and it sounds to be grievous human error in the end, following a [i]known[/i] technical error. And this is a relatively new coaster? I'm terrified, I remember my dad had to build a failsafe/error code system for 'the Shockwave' back in the day for SF: Great America, because the original coaster design ([del]from germany I think[/del] was thinking of a different ride, maybe batman) had a bell/buzzer that would go off just to indicate "there's a problem, [i]somewhere, somehow[/i]". One hell of a 'check engine' light. There's a ton of systems in place by regulation nowadays (granted, regulations probably vary between US/UK), but damn I'm not sure how some of this stuff goes out with a seal of approval. There NEEDS to be a weight sensor array at that stall location, there's no excuse after [now probably 4] instances in which something stalled in the same spot
[QUOTE=dai;47915622] all in all that situation is fucked and it sounds to be grievous human error in the end, following a [i]known[/i] technical error. And this is a relatively new coaster? I'm terrified, I remember my dad had to build a failsafe/error code system for 'the Shockwave' back in the day for SF: Great America, because the original coaster design (from germany I think) had a bell/buzzer that would go off just to indicate "there's a problem, [i]somewhere, somehow[/i]". One hell of a 'check engine' light. There's a ton of systems in place by regulation nowadays (granted, regulations probably vary between US/UK), but damn I'm not sure how some of this stuff goes out with a seal of approval. There NEEDS to be a weight sensor array at that stall location, there's no excuse after [now probably 4] instances in which something stalled in the same spot[/QUOTE] Not even "relatively" new, its Gerstlauer's newest cutting edge coaster system.
It's a real shame and a terrible accident. That's all you can call it: an accident. I have that feeling it's just PR, but good on Merlin Entertainment to just say 'It's on us. We'll take care of you as it's completely our fault' to the victims.
[url]https://www.facebook.com/skynews/videos/vb.164665060214766/1106609352686994/?type=2&theater[/url] god what a bitch
[QUOTE=rampageturke 2;47916383][url]https://www.facebook.com/skynews/videos/vb.164665060214766/1106609352686994/?type=2&theater[/url] god what a bitch[/QUOTE] I lost it when she said "And the smiler is being dismantled as we speak?"
[QUOTE=rampageturke 2;47916383][url]https://www.facebook.com/skynews/videos/vb.164665060214766/1106609352686994/?type=2&theater[/url] god what a bitch[/QUOTE] I despise Kay Burley, its a shame she pretty much co-founded Sky news and is going no where as a result. She is a horrible journalist.
[QUOTE=redBadger;47912039]She's 17. She's lives in a time where this is quite possible for her.[/QUOTE] It sucks though. The girl was a dancer and lost her leg for her birthday. I dont think any money from Merlin is ever going to fix the mental challanges of the subject.
[QUOTE=Jsm;47916897]I despise Kay Burley, its a shame she pretty much co-founded Sky news and is going no where as a result. She is a horrible journalist.[/QUOTE] Christ she goes at him as if he personally fucking caused the accident.
[QUOTE=gt118;47906979]Why would god let this happen?[/QUOTE] and by "this" you mean "all things that ever happen" ?
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