Funworld February 2010

Every attraction knows nothing brings an end to a happy and successful operating season faster than a safety issue: an accident, the spread of a contagious illness, food contamination, or some other problem. The physical, emotional, financial, and public relations costs of such incidents can be overwhelming. Fortunately, almost all of these situations can be avoided with careful planning and the exercise of strict guidelines and practices.

FUNWORLD contacted four experts who deal with varying safety issues to discuss how they’ve successfully planned for and dealt with the incidents that arise for their employees and guests.

Dave Edwards is director of safety, security, and health services for Silver Dollar City Attractions in Branson, Missouri. He is certified by the nation’s largest ride safety organizations, NAARSO and AIMS; he was appointed to the Missouri Amusement Ride Safety Board in February 2005, and appointed to the Regional Homeland Security Oversight Committee for Region D, southwest Missouri, in 2006; and he served on the IAAPA Safety and Maintenance Committee in 2009.

Angus Hutchings is safety manager for Dreamworld and WhiteWater World in Coomera, Queensland, Australia. He oversees the strategic planning for safety, which includes developing and implementing new processes to improve the safety practices at the theme parks; delivering training programs to new and existing team members; coordinating internal and external safety audits; and liaising with governmental and regulatory bodies to ensure the parks meet all environmental and safety obligations.

Dal Freeman is the engineer at Lagoon Park in Farmington, Utah. He designed his first roller coaster, “Fire in the Hole,” at Silver Dollar City in 1970 and believes he may have the longest active tenure in the United States as a roller coaster engineer. He also directed the engineering team that designed the iconic “Magnum” coaster at Cedar Point in Sandusky, Ohio.

Terry Turner is the general manager of Silver Springs in Ocala, Florida. Turner has extensive experience in the attractions industry, having worked at six different parks over the past 37 years. He is a past chairman of the World Waterpark Association (WWA), recipient of the WWA Hall of Fame Award, and has served on the IAAPA safety committee since 2008.

What are some of the most effective measures attractions can take to reduce the spread of contagious illnesses?
Turner: We mandate our employees NOT report to work if they are sick with the flu or have been in contact with anyone who has the flu or those same symptoms.

Edwards: In addition to regular cleaning practices that are in place for daily operations of a park, it is equally important we have positive relationships with local health agencies. This enables us to have current information regarding what health officials may be tracking in our area and increase our cleanliness actions contingent on that information. [Also,] during the recent H1N1 activity, we utilized CDC recommendations to inform our guests and employees of preventative measures to prevent the spread of disease, and we significantly increased the number of locations at our facilities where we provide hand sanitizer for our guests and employees.

Hutchings: One of the most effective ways to control contagious illness is through educating our staff and guests. Educational campaigns typically focus on small, everyday things such as maintaining personal hygiene practices, recognizing illness symptoms, and accessing further information resources. This information is communicated through web sites, posters, signage, notice boards, word of mouth, and media releases.

If guests see a park is taking such steps, do you think it makes them feel more comfortable in coming to the park during outbreaks like H1N1?
Edwards: Absolutely. We placed informational signs at our entrance, restrooms, and first aid facilities to provide information to our guests regarding the CDC recommendations. We also provided hand sanitizer at hundreds of locations throughout the park. These actions were very positively received by our guests as indicated by their comments about their experience at our property.

Hutchings: It is very important guests always feel safe when visiting a park. During times of disease outbreak, guests must also feel confident that the appropriate precautions and hygiene practices are implemented. Being open, honest, and up front with our guests provides this level of confidence.

How do you determine where likely areas are in your park for slips/falls?
Turner: Walk the park grounds consistently, but under different conditions (weather/time of day). What may not be a hazard during the day may be one at night.

Freeman:We work hard on that because on all of our surfaces in stair and ramp areas we use fiberglass and concrete walkways now. The fiberglass we order has different roughtextured surfaces, and it’s heavy enough that you can operate wheelchairs on it.

A slip-and-fall affects perhaps one or two guests, but a food safety situation can affect hundreds of guests. How do you stress this to your employees?
Edwards:All of our food handlers take and must satisfactorily pass the “ServSafe” (a food safety training program) program. Additionally, all food handlers must commit to memory critical safe food-handling actions that must be practiced on a continual basis. We have also implemented an inhouse audit of surface and equipment cleanliness, which provides real-time feedback to the employee and provides for immediate corrective actions and actions to prevent recurrence.

What plan do you have in place to deal with a food illness situation?
Hutchings: Should a food illness be suspected, an investigation would commence to identify the suspect product and have it withdrawn from sale. The investigation would then focus on what caused the problem and how to prevent it from recurring. Throughout this process, guests and members of the public would be informed of the investigation outcomes, as would government food safety authorities. Should the illness affect a larger number of people, a public relations campaign would keep all interested parties informed of the investigation findings and other procedures that may need to be followed.

Turner: All guest incidents, including a report of foodrelated illness, are investigated by on-site senior management. If a specific food product is identified, the product is pulled for further investigation. If the food product is unknown, then all food stands would undergo an immediate inspection. We go overboard on safety in this area and making sure we follow all food preparation and storage procedures carefully to prevent these situations.

In the past there have been tragic instances of guest injury because they defeated safety barricades around hazardous zones. What do you do if someone’s simply determined to do something dangerous?
Freeman: There are some rides that are more inviting than others, and usually what happens is a patron loses a cap, glasses, or cell phone, and the with coasters that are suspended, guests will see a lot of room between the track and the ground and think it’s safe. So around coasters like that, we use fences that are about nine feet tall.

Edwards: We have added warning signs utilizing language that clearly identifies the hazard and placed these signs such that they are visible from any point on the ride perimeter. We have in some areas added secondary fences within the ride perimeter as an added measure to prevent access to hazard areas.

Turner: Watch your guests and employees while they are near the barriers; if they appear to test the access point, you may need to enhance the protection that is currently in place. Warning signs are not a barrier, but they can inform of the consequences of disregarding the barriers that are in place.

Hutchings: Should a guest decide to deliberately breach a safety fence, our staff are trained to be observant and vigilant toward anyone entering a hazardous ride envelope. In this case, the ride operator would press the emergency stop button to prevent the ride contacting the person. Ultimately, guests need to take some ownership and comply with the park’s safety requirements.

As for guests looking for additional thrills by defeating ride restraints, has that been made much more difficult in recent years with the new generation of restraints?
Freeman:We’ve made a lot of progress the past 10 years with restraints and understanding how to restrain the patron in a comfortable way. The [horse collar] restraints aren’t used as much, and we’ve made lap restraints more comfortable. With the horse collars, you had to be careful about earrings, but with the lap restraints, there’s almost nothing above the waist that contacts the body.

Hutchings: In Australia, each ride harness must have a primary and backup restraint mechanism. Once the guest is seated in the ride and the restraints lowered, it is extremely difficult to move one’s torso in any direction. Harness designers must outsmart even the most mischievous guest.

Recently there has been new media attention on some unfortunate and serious employee accidents. How do you balance your emphasis on employee safety and guest safety?
Freeman: With employee safety we have an excellent opportunity because they’re trained and informed in their jobs. Also, there are the OSHA requirements for the safety belts and tie offs when they go up to check brake systems. We rotate our operators so they stay sharp and give them an opportunity to be on a different ride.

Edwards: The safety of our employees is just as important to us as the safety of our guests. All employees must be trained in the safe work practices required to perform their job in addition to training requirements set forth by OSHA.

Turner: The safety of our staff, contractors, vendors, and guests is our number-one priority—if we’re not safe, nothing else matters. A single incident is too many. It is so important to deliver daily reminders to the staff on proper work practices. Also, periodic safety meetings are a great tool to reinforce awareness and vigilance.

Are there some equally important but much-lessconspicuous safety systems or safety practices that you have to deal with?
Freeman: Anything the patron can touch or contact is important. An example is fencing—to avoid entrapment or to have a walkway where someone could trip and fall into a fence. Yet we have to make sure the fences serve their purpose.

Can good reporting prevent future incidents, and if so, how?
Hutchings: Good reporting is critical to accident prevention. The identification of injury trends for both guests and employees provides for the opportunity to develop solutions and prevent similar injuries by incorporating hazard elimination through engineering controls, changes in administrative procedures, or identifying other protective measures. While taking corrective actions based on individual accidents is effective, the real test is to determine if you have corrected an injury trend.

Turner: A “near miss,” where a person is not injured but the potential was still present, is equally important to report and investigate. We spend a lot of time at the park and with our corporate team reviewing incident reports to analyze and improve our programs. This also encourages continuous improvement of operational procedures.

Freeman: When we meet in our IAAPA safety meeting, we work hard on knowing what happened anywhere in our park systems, and we’re also contacted by the manufacturers if there’s an incident somewhere else, and if we have some type of incident, we immediately report it to the manufacturer. It’s information sharing.

Contact News Editor Keith Miller at kmiller@IAAPA.org.