Ha my feelings exactly...I was holding on for dear life when upside down...didn't look that bad waiting in line but it felt so unsecure...guess it was meant to be that way for the scare factor
UPDATE http://abclocal.go.com/ktrk/story?section=news/local&id=8024489 The guy's name is Brian Greenhouse and is actually 47 yrs old. Also: The ride has a pretty good safety record with only one injury reported in its 31 years of service; however, Myra Rock rode that same ride Wednesday with her son, and she told us the safety bar on her car came loose halfway through the ride. Rodeo officials maintain there's never been a documented complaint of a loose safety bar. "We went through the rest of the ride and I had to hold the bar and hold him at the same time," Rock said. "When I got off the ride, I let the operator know that the bar was not working and he told me he knew and he would take care of it."
LOL. Anyone remember the giant can that spun around so fast you just kind of stuck to the sides, but could still slowly crawl around on the padded walls? When it got up to speed the BOTTOM panels even dropped out so the ground was belwo you with no straps, seats, or anything. Surely those are not still being used.
Carnival ride operator didn't see man plunge to his death Despite industry rules, worker glanced away from roller coaster By ZAIN SHAUK and CINDY GEORGE HOUSTON CHRONICLE No one was watching a roller coaster at the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo when a man fell from it and died on Sunday, even though industry standards call for rides to be monitored from start to finish, according to an event organizer and a safety consultant. The ride operator looked away from the cars on the track of the Hi-Miler roller coaster at the time Brian Greenhouse fell 28 feet to his death, said Leroy Shafer, the event's chief operating officer. "He saw the ride start the corner, he looked back down to the next ride loading and then he looked back up and heard people screaming," Shafer said. "When he looked back up the man wasn't in the car." But according to industry standards that Texas ride operators are supposed to follow, the ride operator should have seen how Greenhouse fell, said Ken Martin, a Richmond, Va.-based safety consultant who specializes in amusement rides. "The operator of that ride is mandated to view the entire course of the ride, either with their eyes, with another person or some type of monitoring system," Martin said. "Somebody should have been watching each and every car on that ride." Shafer said the ride operator looked away from the cars for "maybe a second" when the incident happened. No witnesses saw how Greenhouse, of Houston, fell and no one so far has been able to explain how it happened, Shafer said. Greenhouse, 47, was sitting in the first car of the roller coaster when he fell and landed on a passerby, who broke his ankle. Greenhouse's fiancée was sitting two cars behind him. "We just do not understand how he came out of the car," Shafer said. "And at this point, we have no witnesses who can explain how he came out of the car and inspectors are telling us they can find no instance of malfunction." The safety bar and lap strap on the ride were in place when the ride ended, Shafer said. Restraints in place "Everybody is in agreement that, when the ride came down, the bar was down and the lap restraint was down," Shafer said. The Houston Police Department's homicide division is investigating the incident, HPD spokesman Kese Smith said. Smith would not elaborate on what witnesses said they had seen because the probe is ongoing. Harris County's Institute of Forensic Sciences is conducting an autopsy. It was not yet clear whether Greenhouse was intoxicated at the time of the incident, officials said. Greenhouse had a 5-year-old son with his ex-wife, said the man's older brother, Michael Greenhouse. "We are devastated," said Michael Greenhouse by phone from Santiago, Chile, en route to the United States from a medical mission trip in Argentina. The brothers spoke to each other last week. Greenhouse was the second of five children and had worked at AT&T in Houston, his brother said. Michael Greenhouse, of San Francisco, said he received word of his brother's death Monday morning. "He had so much to contribute. … He was a very God-loving, Christ-loving man. And, he really was loved by so many." Greenhouse and his fiancee were likely sitting separately because two adults generally do not fit into the ride's cars, Shafer said. Greenhouse was about 5-foot-8 and weighed about 250 pounds, Shafer said. No one saw how man fell Neither Greenhouse's fiancee, nor any other passengers interviewed by officials, saw how he fell, Shafer said. Two passengers who were sitting behind Greenhouse left immediately after the ride finished. "The ride operator was trying to keep everyone there to get a statement from them, and these two people left immediately," Shafer said. "If they would come forward, we would love to talk with them." The Hi-Miler roller coaster is owned by Ray Cammack Shows Inc., of Arizona, which has contracted to run the rodeo's carnival for 12 years. The rodeo hires its own inspectors who check rides throughout the three-week event, Shafer said. Safety consultants from the private firm Coulter and Associates "have inspected and reinspected this ride and they can find no mechanical malfunction," Shafer said. Greenhouse's death was the first fatality at the carnival in at least 40 years, Shafer said. http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/metropolitan/7485208.html
Maybe this is a sensible rule, but what is the magic "power of looking" supposed to do in this situation? I assume a roller coaster accident occurs far too quickly to stop in that fashion - unless you have X-men style mutant eye powers I doubt this would have avoided the accident.
There aren't many left but they still exist. There's one at Six Flags St. Louis and at Lake Compounce in Connecticut. There are versions of a similar ride at any number of travelling carnivals. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rotor_(ride) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gravitron I can't believe I can't remember what the version at Astroworld was called. Anybody?
All seems very strange. I don't see what the big deal about the operator looking away "for a second" is. It's not like he could have prevented it by watching it happen. What was he supposed to do, run over and catch him? Also seems strange that the safety bar and lap-strap were both in place. And that even the guy's fiancée 2 cars behind him didn't see what happened? With all due respect to the deceased....it sounds like he may have been drunk and goofing around.
In this situation, perhaps nothing. But what if he was slipping out and hanging on for dear life, with maybe his grip holding out for 10 seconds before he was to fall? And of course, it is useful in situations such as this when they need it for forensic purposes.
I can picture a scenario where a guy who has had a few beers is goofing around on the "kiddie" roller-coaster not realizing that just because it's not the Texas Cyclone doesn't mean you can't get seriously hurt or killed. The report says the safety strap and bar were both connected and working fine. The guy weighed 250 pounds so it's not like the strap and bar would have been too loose and he would have fallen out because of it. Again, I hate to make assumptions about this horrible story, but sometimes where there's smoke, there's fire.
If he was not intoxicated, they usually rule that out right off the bat. I mean, is it really a stretch to think that someone might be drinking at the rodeo?? Have you been to the rodeo?
He would have to be a rich man to be drunk at the Rodeo. Beers were 7.50 each. I've already said I went this year and rode that coaster. I said the bar was loose for me too. the turns and drops got my butt off the seat a bunch of times.
I know they have never had an accident before, but it's weird to me that they can pick and choose when to put 1 or 2 people on the car. Seems like one hell of a judgment call to make in a second or two. Where do they draw the line as to when someone can't ride at all?
Same here. I'm 5'8 170lbs The drops would bring me up off the seat. I would hold my friends son around the corner turns and the drops to keep him secure
This guy was 5'8 and 80 pounds heavier than you. I just can't imagine a guy 5'8 250 pounds would be too small for a strap and bar in a kiddie coaster. All I'm saying it that none of this adds up. It just seems like if the coaster was the problem, there would have been more than 1 accident in the last 12 years.
Someone in the comments section of that article wrote: "Shafer is wrong again, the victim was 5 foot 8, but he was 168-170 soaked and wet, far from 250 stated in this article." I'm not sure who to believe....
