Leaderboard

It was recommended by Ms Ramsey during the issue about the operators cctv monitor that there be 1 monitor with 4 split screens and 1 monitor dedicated to the CCTV that monitored the conveyor area but these weren’t implemented. After Ms Ramsey handed the small child to someone else, she went back to assessing the scene and patients and began questioning the ride ops about the amount of passengers still on the ride and in the flipped raft. And we have just adjourned for today. We will resume tomorrow. This is due to Ardent lawyers providing required documents so late. It’s appearing as though the inquest will be delayed further and push into next year. We’re still waiting to see if things stay on schedule but it isn’t looking promising

Ms Ramsey states that there was resistance from management about bringing in staff early for training as that would increase budget. These issues were consist and persistent throughout the length of Ms Ramsey’s employment. Ms Ramsey began at the park as a ride op and gradually moved up to first aid and safety officer. Safety officers weren’t informed about previous documents relating to ride incidents, safety incidents and outcomes from incidents. Ms Ramsey believes it would have been an advantage if safety officers had access to these documents.

Mr Hicks states that he never had any troubles shutting down the ride and that it was a fairly simple process. Mr Hicks also confirmed there was no water level indicator, just a scum line. Mr Hicks has never shut down the ride due to a loss of water or a pump. Mr Hicks agreed that safety on a ride is dependant on not only the safety redundancies in place, but also on how operators, operate the ride. Mr Hicks feels that newly trained staff felt confident to speak with senior staff if they had any questions or concerns. Mr Hickey states that as far as he is aware, there have never been any major injuries on any rides at Dreamworld. Mr Hicks also wasn’t aware of the details of the 2014 incident and how similar it was to the 2016 tragedy. Mr Hicks never imagined such a tragedy could occur, as far as he was concerned, the ride was always safe and had no potential to do this. Mr Hicks has just finished giving evidence. Rebecca Ramsey Registered nurse currently studying at university. Was registered as a nurse in 2010. Previously employed at Dreamworld, began in 2004 and stayed working at the park until the 2016 tragedy. Ms Ramsey was employed as a registered nurse and first aid officer. Ms Ramsey is one of the staff members involved in the civil action that has recently been launched against Dreamworld by former staff members. Ms Ramsey spent about 60% of her time in White Water World and the other 40% in Dreamworld. Ms Ramsey became aware of the situation when she got a radio call for a code 222 blue at the rapids ride. Ms Ramsey states that she arrived at TRR moments after Mr Clark had arrived. Ms Ramsey believes she had sufficient equipment to handle the situation. Ms Ramsey doesn’t believe there would have been any easier way to retrieve someone if they fell into the water. Ms Ramsey was questioned whether the response times or equipment could have been more efficient. The only recommendation that Ms Ramsey can make is that if the thunder river rapids alarm had sounded, more staff would have attended the situation much sooner. Ms Ramsey states that the TRR shut down sequence in a code 6 breakdown costs of 3 actions, sounding the rapids alarm, hitting the conveyor stop button and hitting the e-stop button. Ms Ramsey can’t recall any specific training drills that she was involved in on thunder river rapids but occasionally a training auditor would come around and test operator knowledge on shutdown procedure. It has been stated before that the monitors on the ride are far too small for the operator to manage. There were 9 cctv feeds on the one monitor and it was recommended that there should be a second monitor to help monitor the ride envelope. Ms Ramsey was working part time at Dreamworld while she was studying as she was also working at a local hospital as part of her course.

For clarification on the Shine Lawyers civil action suit against Dreamworld, the 4 staff members involved in that case are the two safety officers from yesterday, Mr Green and Mr Clark. Also included is today’s witness, Ms Ramsey and a witness still to be called, Mr Burke, a former engineer at the park. When Ms Ramsey arrived onsite, she was handed a young child to get out of the station area while trying to ascertain how many people were on the ride. She wasn’t sure if the child was on the ride or not prior to being handed to her. Ms Ramsey doesn’t believe anything could have been done to locate the 4th person that was later found trapped under the water, any sooner. There was no single person in control of the situation, there were multiple people dealing with multiple Different roles when they arrived onsite.

In the first round of the hearing, Police investigators who reviewed the CCTV footage from 2016 mentioned that none of the ride ops pressed the e-stop until much after it was too late. I believe there were already people in the water before any e-stop was hit. The first part of discussions that took place today were mostly between the coroners council and the Ardent Legal Team in relation to the large amount of time It took for Ardent Legal to provide all of the required documents as a majority have only been provided as recently as Monday. Some documents have also been lost due to a power outage that occurred. The first witness has just been called. Ben Hicks Attractions and aquatics manager. It has come out today that there was also an incident In 2014 where two rafts collided and a woman had fallen in the water. Mr Hicks wasn’t aware of the 2014 incident. Mr Hicks mentioned that he recalls the 2001 incident but because it’s been so long, it’s hard to remember details. Mr Hicks was never reminded of the 2001 incident days and even weeks after the 2016 tragedy, he never thought the incidents could be related. Mr Hicks didn’t personally have access to incident reports for the rides. They were available but Mr Hicks never looked at them as he was never required to. Mr Hicks isn’t aware of any staff members who’s role it is to investigate pst incidents and learn from them. Today is the first time that Mr Hicks has seen the incident report from 2001. A lot of the information being talked about is the same as previous safety officers and ride trainers so there isn’t much new information so far.

Hi all, new around here. After the photos and videos on social media I have sketched what I believe may be the layout of this new attraction. Any thoughts?

Speaking from Wonderland knowledge, which should, but may not be the same - the unload point at the end of the conveyor is right next to the pumps. If the pumps were given a power disconnect, water stops flowing within seconds. As the highest point on the ride, the water level should drop RAPIDLY. Most of the pump flow is directed away from the load zone (which is why you have to walk over a bridge to get to the station - the water bypasses the station at that point), so it would be relatively safe to enter the water at the unload zone while the water level was dropping, but it should drain in less than a minute. Based on the first aider testimony, the e-stop wasn't engaged as claimed. Even if the first aider arrived on scene 30 seconds after the radio call, from testimony so far we have in order: operator presses e-stop operator calls control to report emergency - assume 1-2 rings, and then 20 second conversation control sees CCTV, makes the decision to upgrade from 'BLUE' to 'GREY' Makes the radio call to the responding staff - assume 20 seconds radio message We're close to a minute after the e-stop has been pressed according to the operator testimony, and allow another minute for the first aider to grab trauma kits, AED and run down the Q4U line - so two minutes to be on scene and the water is chest deep? Here's an intamin rapids diagram: And here's a dry station photo of the Wonderland Snowy River (during demolition) It's clear to see the water level through the station. It is worth noting however that we know Thunder River had issues with stability in the station, and Dreamworld installed the guiderails under the surface. From pics we saw previously, the guiderails were about a foot or so high, so you can probably add another 300 to the above measurements - giving you a possible 1500 deep water at the station - which isn't much higher than chest deep to begin with, depending on how tall you are (average australian male height is about 175-180cm according to the ABS. My completely uneducated viewpoint - either the e-stop didn't work, or the operator didn't press it as\when claimed.

Mr Clark states there are times where the First Aid clinic is unattended because both the first aid officers are in the park attending with medical issues. Mr Clark was only aware of 2-3 patients when he arrived onsite but then realised there was also another patient. Mr Clark stayed at Dreamworld for about a year after the incident before leaving the company. Mr Clark stated that many things changed after the incident including more staff being hired and policies being changed. Mr Clark doesn’t believe there was ever an emergency drill practiced on a ride. It was all computer learning and talking about an emergency drill situation. Mr Clark mentioned that you can never debrief enough after an emergency situation. When Mr Clark arrived at the ride, he doesn’t recall seeing anyone underwater. Mr Clark believed the First Aid Clinic was adequately stocked and prepared to deal with a medical situation including 4 beds. The primary First Aid Clinic is based in White Water World. When Mr Clark arrived at the ride, he didn’t talk with the ride operator, just handed them a lockout tag and requested more staff before saying “I’m going in the water”. By the time Mr Clark got into the water, it was still at chest height. There was a member of the public performing CPR on a woman and Mr Clark requested 3 ambulances attend. Mr Clark’s main priority was to get the guests out of the water as nothing can be done to help in the water. Mr Clark brought a defibrillator with him to the scene. Mr Clark has just finished giving evidence.

Spoke too soon. It appears wipeout is now back open for business!

I would love it if there was a pre-show. In my opinion that is something that is sorely missing from all Gold Coast theme parks since Bermuda Triangle closed at Sea World (technically before that since they stopped the pre-show on that before they closed it completely.

Mr Clark later clarified that the conveyor was stopped when he arrived at the unload platform to jump in. He was one of the first people onsite as he was in the gold rush first aid clinic so the distance from there, down the fastpass line striaght to the unload platform is pretty quick. It isn’t clear whether the pump was still running when he jumped in but I’d say it was still in the process of draining because he wasn’t in the main trough, he was in the water area near the conveyor and station turntable. The water was so dirty from the nature of the incident and the natural dirtiness of the water since it isn’t exactly cleaned. I believe the 4th person was trapped under something which is why it was harder to notice in all the panic and until the water was fairly low. I can explain this in a lot more detail but I’d rather not in a public forum as those details are the ones covered by the NPO. Happy to privately gore with you though @joz

Further update: When Mr Clark and Mr Green arrived at the scene and were administering first aid, they were only aware of 3 patients. There was still a 4th underwater that wasn't revealed until the water levels had completely dropped. CPR was being performed on one female patient on the unload platform by Mr Clark, two males were in the water around the conveyor area and were unable to be helped and the 4th person was trapped underwater and discovered once the water had drained from the station. Mr Clark mentioned many times that the water was very murky and that he couldn't see the bottom of the troughs. Mr Green had also mentioned many times about the slime on the troughs that made it impossible to stand or walk on without slipping. Also, I'd like to add that Mr Clark and Mr Green are both trained paramedics so they are coping extremely well given what they have witnessed and were involved in. Also todays google doc link: https://tinyurl.com/Wednesday-inquest

Shane Green First Aid Manager Was trained as a paramedic in 2006 and has been since then. Has been employed at Dreamworld since 2013. Mr Green is based in the White Water World first aid clinic and states it took around 3-5 minutes to make it to rapids after the call was made. Once Mr Green arrived onsite, he administered aid for as long as he could. Mr Green stated that there would always be 2 first aid officers on so there could be one based in each clinic. White Water World Lifeguards are also called upon to assist with first aid when required. When Mr Green for arrived at Dreamworld, he believed the medical equipment was seriously lacking but was provided with the correct equipment once he requested it. Mr Green doesn’t believe there was any medical equipment or leading surgeons in the world that would be able to assist or save the lives of the victims. When asked if Mr Green believes equipment could be provided to assist in getting people out of the Thunder River Rapids troughs, he responded that it is difficult because every situation is different. Mr Green also stated that the troughs are impossible to navigate due to slime buildup underwater so he was slipping and falling over while trying to help. Mr Green doesn’t recall the rapid ride alarm sounding, he only remembers hearing a “Code 222 blue” call. Mr Green was asked if he can think of any ways that this whole situation could have been improved. He responded saying no, in this particular case, there is very little more that we could have done. When asked if everything was adequate to deal with that situation, Mr Green advised that it was but there was nothing more that could be done. We have just adjourned for lunch