Actually, as much as I disagree with what Barry Mcfungus pants is trying to say, energy is a very appropriate measure to use when discussing trapping between two objects.
Smiler rollercoaster at Alton Towers - carriage collision
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Actually, as much as I disagree with what Barry Mcfungus pants is trying to say, energy is a very appropriate measure to use when discussing trapping between two objects.
Soldato
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Who's to say they didn't? Without all the details it's hard to know for sure but how do we know the operator didn't see the problem right away, but their training told them that in that situation the ride is designed so that the following car will be held in the mid-section of the ride... then for all we know the operator/s had reacted accordingly, stopped loading the next set of people and begun whatever process they have to undertake to presumably go and evactuate the car of people from the middle of the ride enclosure etc... but then all of a sudden the car had failed to stop as it was meant to?
Seems strange to me that if the car was stuck at the first lift ramp and they knew the 1st car was stuck mid track in the 2nd section they would allow the ride to progress to the mid section lift. I imagine they would know that the only way the car can be recovered is by un bolting from the track and crane recovery ?
They would have also had to override the safety cut outs to get the car to the centre section and then again to allow the car to pass the centre lift and brake point.
Its all a bit odd tbh.
Soldato
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It was a previous employee expressing frustration, claiming it's virtually impossible for this to happen.
So it's possible then
It happened, so quite obviously it is.
You can't really take what a doctor says at face value, or anyone for that matter.
Yeah so? When I had surgery on my face a doctor told me it could be half paralysed. They're always going to give you a worse case scenario to cover their own backs.
Yeah so? When I had surgery on my face a doctor told me it could be half paralysed. They're always going to give you a worse case scenario to cover their own backs.
Soldato
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Well since it happened, I'd say yes. I think the previous employee was leaning towards "couldn't have happened unless the operator majorly messed up."
One thing that seems odd is that the first train of 4 empty cars didn't make it around one of the loops. Surely one of the known variables is how heavy an empty train is and what rolling speed and force it would produce and what gradient this could manage. The design seems slightly flawed in that respect as the only unknown variable would be wind resistance which possibly hasn't been factored in correctly to the design.
I also wonder if the time of day could be significant, since it happened around lunch time perhaps a change in shifts could have led to a failure in human communication in handing over responsibility.
Maybe the first train went through a sensor and it flagged in the system as being clear of that section only to then roll back through a sensor without triggering it or the programming didn't overide the earlier flagging of being clear of that section. It does seem odd that the second train was held for 5 mins or more at the top of the climb though. Hope it produces a log file of events from the sensors and human interactions to get to the bottom of it.
I also wonder if the time of day could be significant, since it happened around lunch time perhaps a change in shifts could have led to a failure in human communication in handing over responsibility.
Maybe the first train went through a sensor and it flagged in the system as being clear of that section only to then roll back through a sensor without triggering it or the programming didn't overide the earlier flagging of being clear of that section. It does seem odd that the second train was held for 5 mins or more at the top of the climb though. Hope it produces a log file of events from the sensors and human interactions to get to the bottom of it.
Soldato
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I'm slightly surprised that they've closed the whole park, and aren't saying when they'll reopen.
Makes me wonder if they have concerns about the safety of other rides as well.
Makes me wonder if they have concerns about the safety of other rides as well.
I'm assuming it's just going to be until whether they work out if it was human error or not. If it was then it will probably be closed a while longer to ensure there is a retraining period, if it's a technical failure it's much more likely to be specific to just that ride I would have thought.
the first car wasnt stuck at the bottom of a loop according to the bbc. it was held on a brake before a decent.
While the comments seem to have disappeared for whatever reasons a "previous operator" was basically claiming that realistically the ride would have to have been in maintenance mode with the operator over-riding alarms for that crash to have happened which if it was true would hint at a park wide disregard for safety protocols so no way the HSE would allow them to continue until it was verified under these circumstances.
From what I have read it was meant to have been sat in the middle of the bat wing part of the track after failing to make it up the other side of the batwing and rolling back down. Nothing confirmed so all speculation but a few people seem to have said the same thing ?
People have said that the second cart was stopped on a break point at the downward slope to inversion 5 which is the first half of the Bat Wing but was released shortly after.
Going by this it seems the ride shut down on the initial lift hill for around 5 mins, then again stopped the car as it came into inversion 5.
The brake point operating just before inversion 5 on cart 1 could be why the 1st cart became stuck as it would reduce momentum and the cart being lighter would not help ? It might have been a fault with this break point activating that caused the 1st cart to get stuck ?
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bbc showed a graphic on the 10pm news night before last. showed the first car stationary just after a crest on a down slope (presumably on a brake) and the second car coming over the crest and rear ending. both then travelled onwards settling at the bottom of the loop.
would explain the low 20mph speed perhaps?
edit: was last night..
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b05x6d9f/bbc-news-at-ten-03062015
@17:20
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