Some roller coasters have seat belts, little pieces of fabric that keep you strapped into the
ride. Other roller coasters, ones that seemingly look very similar, don’t have seat belts. In fact,
Diamondback at Kings Island in the United States, a roller coaster famous for its airtime hills,
has seat belts. The exact same type of ride, Shambhala at PortAventura World in Spain,
doesn’t have seat belts. Why? Why do some roller coasters feature seat belts whilst others don’t,
what do they actually do, and ultimately: should all roller coasters feature these belts?
Just as roller coasters come in a variety of shapes and sizes, roller coaster seat
belts do too. You’ll often find them either in the form of a plane-style latch seat belt,
a car-style button seat belt, or a space-looking clickfix seat belt. These may be placed directly
across the laps of riders, or they might extend from the seat to be connected to the roller
coaster’s main restraint. The exact style of the seat belt might be due to a technical reason
for that ride, or it might purely be the style the manufacturer of that ride opts to go with.
Nevertheless, that doesn’t answer our question:
why can I only find seat belts on some roller coasters?
In a nutshell, seat belts are often added to roller coasters to increase their level of safety.
Though, this isn’t always the case and heavily depends on the design of the ride itself.
For example, some smaller, more tame roller coasters use a seat belt placed across the
laps of riders as the main form of restraint. Attractions like Tower of Terror and Soarin’
at Walt Disney World in Florida use seat belts to secure guests to the ride vehicle.
Whilst some roller coasters only feature seat belts as the main form of restraint too,
such as Flying Turns and Knoebels. With all of these attractions a seat belt paired with the
tame nature of the ride, or the design of the ride vehicle itself, is enough to keep guests safe.
Though for the majority of larger and more intimidating roller coasters, seat belts serve a
slightly different purpose - they act as a form of redundancy. Thrilling roller coasters feature more
rigid restraints than just a seat belt, often in the form of an over-the-shoulder harness, or a lap
bar that rests over guests' laps. These act as the primary form of the restraint for the ride,
but a roller coaster may feature a seat belt as an additional safety measure alongside the primary
restraint. This means if the main restraint were to fail, which is an incredibly unlikely event,
the seat belt would either hold the restraint down, or keep guests secured to the ride vehicle.
However, modern roller coasters are designed with multiple redundancies built into the
primary restraint itself. Often this is in the form of duplicate restraint systems,
meaning two mechanisms hold the primary over-the-shoulder harness or a lap bar in place.
In the extremely unlikely event one of these systems were to fail, the other would keep
riders secure. As a result, in many cases, seat belts act as an alternative redundancy system.
In some cases seat belts have a different purpose, they ensure people are safe to ride the roller
coaster. Seat belts that attach directly from the ride's seat to the primary restraint may act
as a minimum position indicator - meaning that if the seat belt cannot be buckled fully, it’s
not safe for that individual to ride. Therefore the seat belt becomes a visual safety indicator,
ensuring all guests are correctly secured by their restraint. This is the case on Nemesis at Alton
Towers in the UK, as well as many other similar inverted roller coasters around the world too.
Finally, in many other cases, seat belts on roller coasters serve no real purpose,
but instead exist for the comfort of riders. Some guests feel safer
with a seat belt to secure them, compared to not having one at all. In these cases,
seat belts provide peace of mind while adding minimal safety value to the ride itself.
Helix, a roller coaster at Liseberg in Sweden operated without seat belts for multiple years.
However, guest feedback determined that many wished the ride had seat belts,
so they were added retrospectively. In this case, adding seat belts didn’t make the ride safer as it
can operate with or without them. Furthermore, some parks around the world choose to add seat
belts to their attractions to reduce insurance costs. Some insurance providers see the addition
of seat belts as beneficial regardless of whether the manufacturer of the ride requires them.
Now that we know why some roller coasters have seat belts, let's further understand why some
rides simply don’t have seat belts. As mentioned earlier, the intensity or thrill-level of an
attraction often dictates the type of restraint required to keep guests safe. Some tame rides,
like log flumes, or even train rides, don’t have any form of restraint, not even seat belts.
Though, as rides become larger and scarier, the level of safety required
drastically increases. In fact, many big roller coasters around the world have to meet
strict safety standards. These can be set by a range of authorities, some of which
include the TUV, the Technical Inspection Association, based in Germany; and the ASTM,
the American Society for Testing and Materials, based, in, well, the United States of America.
The ASTM in particular have set out strict classifications which place roller coaster
restraints into one of five classes. Each class is more rigorous and secure than the last.
Rides like log flumes have class one restraints, i.e. no restraints at all. Whilst large scale
roller coasters, ones which subject guests to a range of heavy g-force, have class five
restraints. Class five restraints are required to comply with a list of safety measures, including:
Automatic locking Can only be unlocked by a ride operator
External indication the restraint is locked Redundancy of the locking device
Two restraints or one fail-safe restraint
The two highlighted measures are particularly important, especially when evaluating the
need for seat belts. As we’ve already discussed, the inclusion of seat belts
provides a clear external indication of whether the restraint is closed correctly,
and acts as a second restraint alongside the primary over-the-shoulder harness or lap-bar.
However, a seat belt isn’t the only way a ride can satisfy these safety requirements.
Today, many roller coasters feature small lights on their ride vehicles,
located next to or near the train’s restraint systems. Once the restraint has been pulled down
and is secure, the light turns green, indicating to the ride operator that it has closed correctly.
An example of this can be found on Flucht von Novgorod at Hansa Park in Germany.
Instead of having two separate restraints, many modern roller coasters instead feature a single
fail-safe restraint. As mentioned earlier, these types of restraints are fail-safe because they
have two or more parallel restraint systems. This means that the over-the-shoulder harness or
lap-bar is connected to, and held in place by, two identical restraint systems. If one of these were
to fail, which is an extremely unlikely event, the restraint would be held in place by the other. As
a result, a secondary restraint, such as a seat belt, is no longer required to keep guests safe.
However, as we learnt before, some roller coasters that have fail-safe restraint
systems may also have seat belts for other reasons not specifically related to safety.
So there you go, now you know why some roller coasters have seat belts and others don’t! It
depends on a whole host of factors, some safety related, and others not so safety related.
Now you won’t be surprised to see two roller coasters, one with belts and
one without, when visiting a theme park. Take Universal’s Islands of Adventure for example,
the Incredible Hulk features over-the-shoulder restraints with seat belts; whilst VelociCoaster,
another roller coaster in the same park, features lap-bar restraints without seat belts. Is one
more safe than the other? No - they simply use different safety measures to keep guests secure.
If you’d like to learn more about how roller coaster restraints work,
or even some of the systems in place to keep roller coasters safe for visitors of theme parks,
click on the videos on screen. Anyway, thank you for watching, and, we’ll see you all next time.