Only went on this 3 days ago

There's a big difference between proper theme parks and fairgrounds. The main one being that a theme park rollercoaster is built once and stays there while an fairground one is moved around. That in itself makes one much safer than the other. The other part is regulations and that's where there is a realcdifference. At a fairground its what? One person controlling it and another (if you're lucky) letting people on and off? At Alton towers and other proper theme parks there are a series of people controlling the people on and off, they check each and every person on the rides to make sure their harnesses or restraints are secured and then inform the main operator who controls the ride but they don't control the speed or anything like at a fairground, it is an automated program which they stop or start. If anything goes wrong they stop the ride and engineers take over. The operator can not do any of the engineering side (which can be as simple as resetting something) ascthe machine does not allow them to. To do anything like that a second (and third) key is needed to switch the machine. It will then not start again in full ride mode with passengers on until those keys are removed and control is given back to the operator. That's to stop an idiot 17 year old from turning the ride on while its being worked on. They're also so busy that they don't have time to flirt with the visitors and in my experience most have been female anyway.

Last thing is that if a ride does get stuck or is stopped somewhere on the track which happens quite a bit (if it detects too high wind it will stop before it goes over the first drop for example) then all the operators and engineers have safety harnesses that if needed they wear and attach to the track and then they walk up to the stopped carriage to do whatever is needed. I've seen them do that because somebody on the ride had got their mobile out and they felt it was unsafe in case they dropped it and it hit the person behind. In that situation they putnthe ride in engineer mode, held the ride, walked up, took the phone and walked back down. Put it back in ride mode and set it off.

From what I gather yesterdays accident was because of confusion somehow. An extra car was apparently supposed to be added to the track and there seems to be confusion as to whether it was or not.

The smiler is well known for having issues with wind. Not unsafe issues but performance issues. When it gets a strong headwind the cars which are not under power at that point struggle to up one of the hills and they effectively stall and roll back down that part of the track. A bit crap as far as the ride goes but not unsafe as there are so many things in place that stop the car behind that there is no danger of it smashing into the back. (Proper roller coasters work on distance between cars not time). What happened yesterday is that the empty car stalled going up the hill most likely due to wind. The full car behind stopped automatically on its way up the previous hill as per the safety system and it was held there for a while, again as per the instructions. Then somehow the full car was set off again upcthe hill and down into the empty car. God knows how that happened. If I was taking a guess I'd say that an extra car WAS added to the track and the operator somehow either didn't realise or completely forgot about it. Checked that 3 cars were in the station and set off the 4th on the hill without thinking there was a 5th out there somewhere. That's justnanguess, probably completely wrong to be fair

 

They were actually now that I've read up on it more. The front four people were seriously injured (one was losing too much blood) and so obviously they focused on those first but according to the fire brigade all the others behind were treated in the ride itself and were stayed with by people who went up comfort them. Like you say it must be horrible to be stuck for so long but I can understand why they had to as the four seriously injured were obviously a much bigger concern. The main problem was that it didn't happen on the ground so there is only so much you can do to rescue everyone at the same time. Apparently by the time the fire engines got there Alton towers medical staff were already up treating everyone on the ride and other staff had built the aerial platform and scaffolding system around the ride to give somewhere to work. It actually sounds like the emergency training is akin to that on board a plane.

 

you would like jurassic park ride at universal studios, all the moving dinosaursas you go around in a boat

then theres a t-rex that tries to eat you then you fall near virtical (it feels like) for 85 foot and you dont expect it because its just a little speed bum sized bit you go over before you drop and because of the t-rex you have no time to brace yourself

its reyt good