When I was a child, I went on roller coasters in the UK and experienced the thrill of going around curves at high speeds and with sudden drops. But as I grew up, such stomach-turning motion ceased to have any appeal and I have long since stopped going on them. But some people clearly enjoy the experience and seek ever more thrilling rides and owners of amusement parks were very willing to indulge them and began to compete by offering faster, higher runs and more tight and rapid turns.
The thrill that riders experience comes from the rapid changes in velocity, that results in the so-called g-forces they experience when their velocity undergoes changes in magnitude or direction over a short time interval. In the latter case, the greater the speed and the smaller the circle in which they turn, the higher the g-value. But sudden changes in the acceleration (like a sudden drop to almost free-fall) can also produce the kind of disorienting effects that riders seem to enjoy
But the human brain is not a rigid object in the skull. It floats in a protective liquid and sudden movements of the head results in a lag between the motion of the skull and the brain inside that causes the brain to hit the inside of the skull, just like a passenger in a car that hits an object and comes to a sudden halt gets thrown against the windshield, unless they are tightly belted and there are airbags so that the rate of change in the passenger’s speed is greatly reduced and the impact is spread over a much wider area. It is these rapid changes that cause brain damage such as concussions. These impacts are the source of the CTE injuries increasingly reported by football players due to the repeated collisions they experience, and is of increasing concern to rugby and soccer players as well.
But the basic laws of physics and the nature of brain structure may be signaling that we have reached, and perhaps exceeded, the threshold at which these rides can be taken safely. An amusement park is now being sued for designing a ride that is causing serious injury and even death.
California’s Six Flags Magic Mountain is facing lawsuits from three people who alleged they suffered “catastrophic brain damage” after riding the X2 rollercoaster.
More than 100 other people also claimed that they experienced traumatic brain injuries from the attraction at the Valencia amusement park, according to the law firm representing the plaintiffs.
…The ride has faced increased scrutiny in recent months amid reports of riders becoming gravely injured.
In July, two women experienced brain hemorrhages and had to undergo emergency surgery after going on the X2 – one of whom, 25-year-old Naomi Greer-Wilkinson, remains hospitalized. Attorneys say that doctors attributed the injuries to a “rapid acceleration-deceleration event” they experienced on the X2.
An August CNN investigation found that over nearly 20 years there have been more than a dozen reports of serious injuries, including two deaths, associated with the X2 coaster.
…The park describes the X2 as a “fifth-dimension wing roller coaster [that] will have even the most hardened thrill seeker screaming” and that is “downright scary”. It features seats that rotate 360 degrees and flip as the ride reaches speeds of up to 76mph, racing through half loops that suddenly become “sheer drops”.
More than 300 people contacted Dordick’s firm to report injuries, he said. Attorney Christopher Bulone said that experts have said the ride was built to be more dangerous than others, and it has more variables and forces.
“It’s the design of this ride that makes it inherently dangerous and makes it dangerous in a way that no reasonable rider would expect,” he said. “Time after time innocent people are coming off the ride with permanent brain damage.”
Companies must really be compelled to limit the dangers that riders experience. We simply cannot trust in the good sense of people, especially young people, to avoid rides that have such risks. As long as such rides exist, very often peer pressure, the desire to prove to one’s friends that one is not afraid, may persuade people to go on the rides even if they personally have misgivings.
I don’t think amusement parks *design* roller coasters. They rely on a limited number of engineering firms. The amusement park paint and decorate the same (very large) machine that other parks (including their same-branded and self-owned park, elsewhere in the country) with their own branding and art styles.
At issue to me is is the engineering firm that designed and tested (?) this machine still in business to be held liable or not. At issue to the courts is did Six Flags maintain, repair, and test this machine with proper instrumentation that itself is well-maintained as it wears over time, so that the roller coaster performs as-designed. It might be profitable to this huge company to still have a machine that injures and kills people, so long as “what they pay out” is less than “what having folks continue to visit their park”. Measured, of course, in USD.
In the United States’ capitalist system, that is the compulsion, I am afraid. The other half is you blogging about it although most of us here are old. Give me a merry-go-round any day.
I believe there is a general expectation of safety at amusement parks. I don’t think kids need to be dumb and impressionable to find riding the rides on-offer to be part of the general amusement to be had at amusement parks. I don’t feel that those who like to ride rides that I do not prefer to be dumb or impressionable any more or less than the average citizen. They just like something I don’t.