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On June 29, a ride operator was fatally ejected from the Mind Scrambler, a spinning ride at Rye Playland amusement park in New York. 21-year-old Gabriela Garin was the third person to be killed by a ride at Rye since 2004, and the second fatality on the Mind Scrambler. The public records produced by the New York Department of Labor on the first two fatalities and news reports on the latest accident show a disturbing pattern of operational inattentiveness that may be endangering the public and the park’s employees.
In May 2004, 7-year-old Stephanie Dieudonne was fatally ejected from the Mind Scrambler. Although the child met the manufacturer’s minimum height limit for children riding alone, the adult-sized lap bar was not designed to fit closely against children and failed to keep her safely contained. Investigators believe the child may have turned around in the seat to wave at her friend, inadvertently placing herself in an ejectable position. The ride’s setup in a darkened tent created an delightfully eerie mood, but also made it impossible for the operator to watch the actions of riders. Despite the lack of fitted restraints and the inadvisability of operating a Scrambler in the dark, the ride and its mode of operation technically complied with all industry standards. State officials found no code violations. No orders were issued. A month after the accident, the park announced it had voluntarily agreed to install seatbelts that would fit child riders, install some lights in the tent, and add an additional operator station to ensure that all cars and all riders could be observed during the ride cycle.
The following year, another 7-year-old child was killed by a different ride at Rye Playland. Ye Olde Mill Ride is described as a tunnel-of-love-style boat ride through a dark building with scenes of dragons and gnomes, waterworks, explosions, and a collapsing dam. According to the ride’s operating manual, a minimum of four operators are required, with three operator stations located inside the darkened building to watch for problems and assist riders in case of emergency. The ride operators on duty told investigators that two of the four crew members left their stations while the ride was operating “to get some cold water”, leaving no one to supervise the inside of the dark ride. The two AWOL operators returned 25-30 minutes later to find EMTs surrounding the ride. The remaining two operators were unaware that one of their riders had failed to emerge from the building, despite the not-so-subtle clue that one car came back with nothing inside except a wet shoe. The child’s parent eventually asked why her little boy hadn’t gotten off the ride yet. A search ensued. Thirty minutes later, the child’s body was found. He had fallen into the machinery near the ride's exit and was fatally injured.
Public statements issued by the Dept. of Labor cleared the park of any negligence, despite the fact that the operators had abandoned their positions, leaving the inside of the ride unsupervised. The accident report on the Mill Ride fatality included the results of a 3rd party safety audit commissioned by the park after the 2004 Mind Scrambler accident. The audit report documented a host of operational failures, including multiple observations of understaffed rides, operators not attending to duties, and supervisors failing to address chronic staff misbehavior. The park did not have Operational Guidelines for 8 of their 27 rides – including the Mind Scrambler. The report made special mention of operators leaving their positions at their own discretion to get drinks, bring food back to the ride, or talk with their co-workers while the ride was running. “Operations management turning their backs and allowing Ride Operators/attendants to leave the immediate area during a ride cycle is traveling down a slippery slope. When any policy is written it must be enforced, not tolerate deviations that grow first into habit and soon become the rule.” One year after that report was submitted to upper management at Rye Playland, operators were still leaving their posts at will, and another child was dead.
And now, another person has died. News reports on Friday's tragedy stated that the Mind Scrambler was understaffed at the time of the accident. Only one of the two operator positions was manned, and that operator’s view was partially blocked, which is precisely why the park installed a second operator station after the first death in 2004. The ride’s manufacturer issued a Safety Alert in January of 2006, reinforcing the need for operators to see what’s going on at all times. “Be sure your Scrambler operators can see the passengers at all times before, during, and after the ride”. The alert was written in response to the death of 7-year-old Stephanie on the Mind Scrambler at Rye, and the role that poor visibility played in the tragedy.
One of the most discouraging things about this saga (to me, anyway) is that these accidents happened in a state where I know and respect the regulatory officials. State agencies are the appropriate authorities to monitor and mitigate problems related to operational policies of a particular park. The NY inspectors I’ve met are dedicated to safety. Somewhere, though, the ball has been dropped, repeatedly. Why didn’t the death of two children combined with evidence of chronic operational problems prod anyone into action? The first two fatalities were written off as regrettable anomalies caused by bad children or bad parenting, and now another person is dead. Three fatalities in three years at the same park is an abysmal record in this industry.
Now that an employee has been killed, a different arm of the regulatory agency will be brought in to look at Rye’s operation. We’ll see whether the worker safety folks, federal or state, have more authority to deal with Rye’s haphazard approach to risk management and employee oversight. I hope the New York legislature takes effective action to strengthen the states's ride safety program. Perhaps the authorizing statute is weak in the area of regulating operational oversight. Perhaps politics come into play. Rye is an historic park and sentiment may be protecting the park from outside censure. Whatever the underlying reasons, customers and employees are paying the price in human lives, and that needs to stop. Families who patronize New York’s amusement parks – even historic Rye Playland -- expect and deserve a reliable set of safety checks and balances.
Epilogue: According to witness statements included in the state's report, the ride crew's manager boarded an open car after loading guests. She was kneeling backwards rather than sitting properly with her seatbelt latched. The crew member at the operator controls (whom she was supposed to be supervising) yelled at her to sit down, but then started the ride anyway. The crew manager was swaying and dancing to the music as the ride accelerated. The lights added to the ride as a safety feature after Stephanie Dieudonne's death were only designed to stay on during start up and slow down. Once the ride reached full-speed the lights went off. This was the point at which the ride operator was ejected from her seat and hit repeatedly by the ride.
The second operator station installed after Stephanie's accident was not manned at the time of the ride operator's death. Employees reported that it was rarely, if ever, used. Despite the fatal accident on the Mind Scrambler three years prior and the death of another 7-year old child at the same park two years earlier, the ride owner had never implemented a formal documented training program or provided attendants with a ride operations sheet as required by industry standards. The ride had passed state inspection and insurance requirements despite these deficiencies.
OSHA investigators might have insisted on mitigation of these chronic problems following the death of the ride crew manager, but Rye Playland is owned by the county and, therefore, exempt from OSHA oversight.
