This is horrifying. Supposed to be a press conference soon with more details. Rumors seem to indicate it happened on the Verrukt, the world's tallest waterslide.
"Considering the allegations from Friday’s indictment, we were not surprised at the actions taken by the Attorney General to charge Jeff," said Schlitterbahn spokeswoman Winter Prosapio in a statement. "We as a company and as a family will fight these allegations and have confidence that once the facts are presented it will be clear that what happened on the ride was an unforeseeable accident." [Reply]
Originally Posted by Dartgod:
Jeff Henry, the co-owner of Schlitterbahn, was arrested on Monday in Cameron County, Texas, on charges related to the 2016 death of a 10-year-old boy on a water slide in Kansas.
Originally Posted by Deberg_1990:
No, I think they were properly seated. You want to seat heaviest in the back, although that was quite a weight discrepancy between front and back.
The park is still most likely at fault. I think it's just a badly engineered ride. There shouldn't have ever been a second hill after that initial big drop. That combined with some of the safety measures designed to slow the raft didn't work properly. Then he died from the safety netting put in place to keep people inside the slide. A lot of freak variables combined led to tragedy.
Sounds like the state of Kansas has a similar stance. [Reply]
Originally Posted by Dartgod:
Jeff Henry, the co-owner of Schlitterbahn, was arrested on Monday in Cameron County, Texas, on charges related to the 2016 death of a 10-year-old boy on a water slide in Kansas.
Its a tragic shame really. Henry has been truly innovative and designed some really unique slides. Hes a legend in the waterpark industry.
Not excusing his behavior in this though. From reading thru the indictment, i think him and Miles should both see jail time. An epic clusterfuck from the top down. The ride should have never been built in the first place......then they tried to coverup its safety flaws. [Reply]
Originally Posted by Dartgod:
Jeff Henry, the co-owner of Schlitterbahn, was arrested on Monday in Cameron County, Texas, on charges related to the 2016 death of a 10-year-old boy on a water slide in Kansas.
Originally Posted by :
"During the civil matter, attorneys involved noted that we cooperated fully, provided thousands of documents, and that nothing was withheld or tampered with," Prosapio said in a statement. "The secret Grand Jury never heard one word from us directly, nor were we allowed to provide contradictory evidence. And we have plenty."
I do agree that this is important to consider. This obviously sounds really bad, but innocent until proven guilty and all. [Reply]
The Hyatt sky walk accident in KC nobody went to jail or were even arrested. I believe the design firm went under been so long cant remember was it Kivet Myers. The architect and structural engineer may have lost their licence in Missouri but I have forgotten.
What stinks in this deal is they built the thing without mockups and when testing they could not keep the rafts from going airborne at second hump meant to slow it up. Instead of biting bullet and redesigning and rebuilding the second hill they cut corners. They from what I gathered put an abrasive to slow it down at the bottom of first hill and netting over the peak of the second hill. It worked for a while but routine maintenance on the abrasive braking was probably not kept up with due to downtime of a popular ride. A recipe for disaster and this is just a guess on my part. [Reply]
Originally Posted by srvy:
The Hyatt sky walk accident in KC nobody went to jail or were even arrested. I believe the design firm went under been so long cant remember was it Kivet Myers. The architect and structural engineer may have lost their licence in Missouri but I have forgotten.
What stinks in this deal is they built the thing without mockups and when testing they could not keep the rafts from going airborne at second hump meant to slow it up. Instead of biting bullet and redesigning and rebuilding the second hill they cut corners. They from what I gathered put an abrasive to slow it down at the bottom of first hill and netting over the peak of the second hill. It worked for a while but routine maintenance on the abrasive braking was probably not kept up with due to downtime of a popular ride. A recipe for disaster and this is just a guess on my part.
totally different scenario. Hyatt was caused by a seemingly insignificant change made at the request of the contractor. The engineer reviewed it and approved it without fully pursuing the impact of it, and the contractor made some assumptions that the engineer did not back up. It was a truly unfortunate mistake but was far from negligence, gross or otherwise.
This case was gross negligence from the start. Henry in particular was aware of the potential, and video from the grand opening even shows him and the other designer watching the first rides and asking concernedly if a raft hit the net, then did nothing about it. It will be telling to find out what exactly occurred between Miles and the company - WAS he directed to do the things he did either directly or implictly, or did he chose to cover up things on his own. [Reply]
Originally Posted by srvy:
The Hyatt sky walk accident in KC nobody went to jail or were even arrested. I believe the design firm went under been so long cant remember was it Kivet Myers. The architect and structural engineer may have lost their licence in Missouri but I have forgotten.
What stinks in this deal is they built the thing without mockups and when testing they could not keep the rafts from going airborne at second hump meant to slow it up. Instead of biting bullet and redesigning and rebuilding the second hill they cut corners. They from what I gathered put an abrasive to slow it down at the bottom of first hill and netting over the peak of the second hill. It worked for a while but routine maintenance on the abrasive braking was probably not kept up with due to downtime of a popular ride. A recipe for disaster and this is just a guess on my part.
actually they did do mockups, and after testing DID bite the bullet and redesign the second hill. Then summarily disregarded much of the changes such as the braking system and mat. That is what makes this even more gross negligence. [Reply]
Originally Posted by PunkinDrublic:
Let the free market determine water slide safety.
They built it in Kansas because of the lax regulations. Maybe if its going to kill your citizens, the government of Kansas should have more standard regulations. [Reply]
Originally Posted by BigRedChief:
They built it in Kansas because of the lax regulations. Maybe if its going to kill your citizens, the government of Kansas should have more standard regulations.
Maybe the citizens of Kansas want amusement park rides that could potentially kill their children. [Reply]
Originally Posted by BigRedChief:
They built it in Kansas because of the lax regulations. Maybe if its going to kill your citizens, the government of Kansas should have more standard regulations.
Those lax regulations provide dozens jobs for ride operators. [Reply]