Australian Ride Safety Culture

[jhunt2]

4 hours ago, Dean Barnett said:

RFID tags don't make the ride safer - the attendant could just go down the train swiping rfid tags and the train would be marked as secure.

its probably the parks on purpose slowing down operation to reduce wear and tear.. which is pretty unacceptable especially in peak periods. 

I've already explained from an operator's perspective why the RFID tags and other technologies are valuable protections for us. I've already said that we know it doesn't make the ride safer, that's not the purpose of it. Just like it's not the purpose of a CCTV camera or an operator logbook. Those are in place for when something happens, not to prevent that something from happening.

And now you're coming up with these theories with absolutely no basis and contributing them to the discussion as probable fact. Honestly, that's peak 7 News Gold Coast behaviour.

[DaptoFunlandGuy]

14 hours ago, Dean Barnett said:

I get all that.. but alarm systems / CCTV / locked windows and deadbolts do actually reduce risk - Seat belts and the RFID system do not reduce risk.

*beats head against wall*

Ok, read this verrrrrrrrrry sloooooooowly....

Seatbelts. and. the. RFID. system. reduce. risk, because. the. system. won't. dispatch. without. the. operator. scanning. their. RFID. tag. within. a. few. seconds. of. the. seatbelt. going. in. 

The insurance company can be assured that it was an operator who secured the rider because the RFID tag proves it occurred. There's no question about whether the guest or the operator closed the harness, or whether the operator checked if the harness was locked. the system log PROVES that a trained operator was present at the time.

14 hours ago, Dean Barnett said:

Why can't ST operate like that?

Because they recently got sued for negligence over a homemade ride with poor procedures and maintenance and having systems that are "above and beyond" industry standards is probably a good thing for the following reasons:

1. it covers their arse
2. it makes the general public who ride it feel like its safer because everything is double checked
3. it makes the insurers more confident that another incident is unlikely.

14 hours ago, jhunt2 said:

If they're sacrificing a bit of efficiency in order to never repeat those mistakes, I'd say that's a pretty smart idea from their safety team.

This. This. 1000% this. 

13 hours ago, Dean Barnett said:

RFID tags don't make the ride safer - the attendant could just go down the train swiping rfid tags and the train would be marked as secure.

Someone isn't listening again. The RFID must be scanned within a small timeframe after the seatbelt is buckled. The seatbelts can't all be inserted in advance because it will time out. So you'd have to coordinate every rider buckling the belt just before the operator got there and if one thing went wrong, you'd have to start over. With the current system in place, allowing them to do the seatbelt is actually the most efficient method to interact with the RFID ***AND THIS IS WHY IT MAKES THE RIDE SAFER BECAUSE IT IS CERTAIN THAT THE OPERATOR CHECKED THE RESTRAINT*** rather than pretending to, which is what you're implying.

I've got news for you too - Operators take their jobs very seriously. They don't want to kill anyone. They're not going to take shortcuts on purpose, so what you're alleging is just offensive. 

This system isn't to prevent "on purpose shortcuts" because it doesn't need to generally. It's there to prevent shortcuts BY ACCIDENT. If something momentarily distracts an operator (like my conversation with them) and they forget to do something and then dispatch - that could be unsafe. But the ride timed out because they didn't scan the RFID in time, and so they had to recheck it to ensure it was done properly. Those sort of accidental inadvertent errors is what the system is designed to catch.

@Dean Barnett - please just take a step back and look at this conversation - you're on your own here. Several people have taken great pains to counter your arguments with reasonable explanations that are plain for anyone to see. You're not going to convince anyone. 

We all agree that our local parks are woefully slow in their operations. We also agree that there are things they COULD do to improve things. Some of those are procedural - such as opening air gates earlier or grouping earlier (but not with a fucking turnstile), and a lot of it is cultural.

 

But, and this is a huge but - and *especially* not post-TRRR:

nobody is going to favor trading off things that are done for safety in place of efficiency.

Whether you think its theatre, whether you think it doesn't change or improve safety, if the control in question is done for even the appearance of safety - nobody is going to agree to remove it because that would make it appear to be less safe, and that isn't something that our park-going public will tolerate in this post-TRRR world.

[Gobbledok]

Surely a big factor that needs to be acknowledged here is that insurance assessors are not theme park junkies that analyze rides in the way we might. 
They are looking every box to tick that could possibly be brought up in a courtroom, sensible or not. 
If an insurance company wants a ‘silly’ thing done in order to reduce premiums, parks will do it. 

[i2145]

With theme parks safety is first and good dispatch times and operations are and added bonus. Their main focus is safety.

[REGIE]

This topic probably has the most detailed explanation of extra safety precautions on roller coasters ever written. It’s incredible. If anyone can still go “I don’t get it” they are just stubborn and a lost cause  

[Naazon]

Surely Turnstiles would improve safety though?

[Baconjack]

Having visited MW and SW this week a few interesting take aways from it.

The practices regarding minimum and maximum height checking seems to have gotten more strict since Covid. Now I'm a tall fellow who ordinarily is barely under the Intamin max height restriction (BD, Superman, and JR), and I wear volleys and a weighted back brace to parks to artifically shorten my height as a fail safe (have this down to a science lol). The practice now is basically "feet together, stand up straight" yada yada, much more formalised and standard from when I last visited in 2019. Can't get away with shit like slanting your back slightly like you could before covid. Probably for the best though.

Also, ops now tell guests not to do their own seatbelts on Rivals (as well as trident and vortex), instead they have to do it themselves. When did this change because I certainly remember this not being the case in its opening year or at my last visit (2019). I thought otherwise Rivals and Leviathan ran really well. Under 2 minute dispatches usually which isn't bad for Village standards where I'm expecting at least 3-4. But the seatbelt thing adds probably another 30 seconds to the process which helps when you're only running one train.

[REGIE]

2 hours ago, Baconjack said:

I wear volleys and a weighted back brace to parks to artifically shorten my height

You really have it down pat. Good job I applaud that.

 

2 hours ago, Baconjack said:

Also, ops now tell guests not to do their own seatbelts on Rivals

That is new to me too. I haven’t been to movieworld for about 6 months and when I went I had to do my own seatbelt on rivals 

[Rivals]

9 minutes ago, REGIE said:

That is new to me too. I haven’t been to movieworld for about 6 months and when I went I had to do my own seatbelt on rivals 

you haven’t been able to do your seatbelt since atleast 2021 and if you do it anyways they make your restraint come back up so they can do it themselves.