It's 6 a.m. at Six Flags Magic Mountain, and the
maintenance team has been inspecting the park's 19
roller coasters and other rides since 4 a.m., ensuring
each and every one is fully operational before the park
opens at 10:30.
Magic Mountain is just one of approximately 308
amusement parks in the United States.
And pre-pandemic, the industry saw continual
growth and is expected to reach $16.8 billion in total
revenue in 2022.
With Disney, Six Flags and Universal Studios holding
the top market share.
And while amusement parks are meant to be fun, the
industry has seen its fair share of injuries and
deaths. In 2019, there were 1299 ride-related injuries
in the U.S., along with 22 deaths since 2010.
In March 2022, a 14 year old fell out of a free fall
ride and died at Ikon Park in Orlando, sending
shockwaves through the industry. His passing was
captured on video and circulated around social
media. According to the National Safety Council,
there was 0.8 injury per million rides in 2019.
We have an awesome record of safety, as does the theme
park industry in general.
When you look at the 157 million rides that we
deliver in a year, you know, people will trip, they
will sit on a queue line and fall backwards, you
know, when you have thousands of people in an
area in a day, there are things that happen.
We address that on a case-by-case basis, but, you
know, when you look at the theme park, National Safety
Council puts out a report each year on the theme park
industry in general. When you look at us versus other
industries, you will see that we are a very safe
industry. You're more likely to be injured on your
way to a theme park in your car than you are at a theme
park.
With rides becoming bigger, taller, faster, and steeper
every year, consumers may wonder how truly safe
amusement park rights are.
CNBC spoke to industry experts and the safety team
at Six Flags to find answers.
Amusement parks did not always look the way they do
today. The earliest amusement park was erected
in 1583 in Denmark and featured entertainers,
primitive rides, music, and games in the initial years
of its operation.
A few centuries later, one of the most legendary
amusement areas opened in 1829.
Coney Island in Brooklyn was linked to NYC via
roadway and became a hotspot for outdoor
attractions. It also eventually became home to
the first true roller coaster in America.
Following World War II, today's biggest and best
amusement parks began opening, including
Disneyland in 1955, Six Flags in 1961, Disney World
in 1971, Universal Studios in 1990, along with several
others. With so many parks opening, a roller coaster
arms race broke out through the 2000s.
A world record for the tallest and fastest coaster
was broken three times.
With a constant chase for the next best ride an
ongoing effort, it may come as a surprise that rides
were not always regulated for safety, despite how old
the industry is.
The first sign of unofficial regulation did
not arrive until 1929 in Wyoming.
Other states followed suit in the 1960s.
It was not until 1981 that federal government
regulation was officially introduced, but only for
mobile rides used at local carnivals and fairs due to
complicated definitions of consumer products.
Today, fixed site rides are not federally regulated, but
they are subject to state-specific laws, ASTM
international safety standards, and other
independent examinations.
Each state is a little bit different based on how they
manage the licensing certification of our rides.
But it's most important to know, too, that Six Flags
also brings in a third party company to inspect
every ride every year independently of what the
state is doing, of what Six Flags is doing, to ensure
that we have that checks and balance, that our rides
are truly operating at the level that we say they are,
at 100%.
Today, coaster and ride technology is continuously
reaching new heights.
Levitating tracks, virtual reality, and animatronics
are all newer implementations responsible
for some of the world's newest and most exhilarating
experiences. Safety has come a long way as well.
Ride safety laws have been successfully implemented in
44 states and are often reevaluated.
Roller coasters are developed and constructed
for several years before they even see their first
real riders. The time and cost depends on the
material, ride length, rider type, and whether or
not the ride is themed.
Wooden coasters take about eight months to finish,
while steel coasters take around one and a half years.
The average cost to build one is approximately $8
million, with the most expensive coaster being Walt
Disney World's Expedition Everest, which took six
years and $100 million to build.
The process begins with the development of a ride
concept, which is then bid on by amusement park
companies. Once a contractual agreement is
made, the plot of land where the ride will be built
is evaluated before construction can even begin.
From start to finish, a team of multiple engineers
in different specialties, computer, design,
structural, industrial and civil, helps in every step
of the process.
Well the challenges you have, first of all, is in
what I call the blue sky phase, you try and be as
creative as possible.
And then once that level of creativity has been
successful, you've got a concept, you've got an idea
that it's going to be the next great ride, the next
great experience, you then have to transition that into
a highly focused, detailed engineering effort.
And that engineering effort on every level has guest
safety as its absolute priority.
So you actually will build that structure in a
theoretical three dimensional world, using
computerated design.
Once computer testing and simulation is completed and
approved, the manufacturing and construction phase can
begin. Factories begin fabricating and assembling
all the parts for the ride, including the tracks,
brakes, lifts, and support beams.
From there, the parts are transported to the park and
assembled over the course of several months or even
years. Once construction is completed, the concern for
safety continues to be a daily, systematic part of
the ride process.
Larry Chickola, Six Flags's chief engineer, was
instrumental in creating industry-wide safety
standards.
So whether a ride is the tallest, the fastest, or a
slower child ride, we still use the same standards than
when we design rides.
There's a lot of standards, especially regarding the
G-forces that riders experience on coasters, that
feeling of being pushed into your seat or lifted out
of your seat. So we've closely follow the standards
that are set out in the industry. Everything about a
ride is very engineered.
They're very custom and very highly engineered
devices. So the passenger, of course, they're sitting
in the train, they have the restraints, the monitoring
of the restraints. The strength of the restraint
has to be strong enough for the biggest person and so on
and what the ride forces are.
So we'll go through and analyze and calculate all
that. The train has to be built to take the weight of
the riders, the strength of the ride, all of the load
cases. And the structures have to be strong enough.
All of that being overseen by the control system.
There's nothing in the world like Action Park.
Action Park in New Jersey was known as the most
dangerous amusement park in the country, with reports of
six deaths, 26 head injuries, 14 broken bones
and a slew of personal injury lawsuits causing it
to promptly close in 1996.
Luckily, the number of incidents has decreased over
the years. Safety in the amusement park industry is
accounted for more deeply than in the past.
Rides today are obviously more sophisticated than they
were even five years ago, ten years ago.
But if you look at the data you will actually see, from
20 years ago until now, you'll see a decrease in the
incidence level.
Our industry uses the same software, the same skill
set, that comes out of the aerospace industry.
That allows us to make rides extremely exciting but
extremely safe at the same time.
Parks have to deal with a variety of challenges, like
obese and disabled people wanting to ride roller
coasters. A report showed that the teen who died at
Ikon Park exceeded the ride's weight limit.
We train them to, how to have that tough conversation
when somebody may not be eligible to ride a ride for
whatever reason that might be. All of our team members
go through what we call verbal judo and tactical
communication. It's for them to learn how to defuse
the situation and bring the level down from here back
down to an opportunity where we can actually
address the issue that is affecting the guests.
Here at Six Flags Magic Mountain, safety procedures
start as early as 4 a.m.
with mechanics and electricians starting the
days first ride inspections.
Well, this morning we're here at West Coast Racers.
And the maintenance team is going through their
inspections and their daily checks and all of the
preventative maintenance items that we need to go
through in order to make sure that we've got a safe
operation. The guys that you see behind me are going
through a very detailed inspection.
They have that inspection on a tablet.
And they enter, they're told exactly what it is they
need to do. They enter in the data that they find.
They're able to take photographs, ask questions,
refer to documents about how something should be
behaving. We can use this data for trend analysis so
that we can make sure that we improve our reliability
and and keep our high focus on safety.
We have mechanical personnel, electrical
personnel, we have craftsmen in fiberglass and
upholstery, and painters, and just an entire team of
people that come out here every single morning with
the vision of making this ride, as well as all the
rides in the park, the best experience that we can make
for people.
The park's Operation Safety Team meets at 9:30 a.m.
to debrief on the day.
Before rides can even begin to see the day's first
riders, they must be signed off by at least two people
from the maintenance team.
Once inspections and meetings are done, ride
safety is accounted for throughout the day with ride
operators, who ensure lap bars, restraints, and
overall ride functions are working smoothly.
Our parks are cities within a city.
It's important to note that in some cases, our daily
attendance can eclipse the census of a city that we're
operating in. So we have created the strategy and
resources to ensure that we can protect our guests and
team members in addition to ride safety, but just
general safety in the event of any type of natural
disaster or issue that can happen.
So, you know, we employ our own medical services
department. We have our own security force at all of our
parks, including the adoption of using outside
police officers that we pay for every day at our
facilities to keep to keep our mini city safe as well.
In the rare event of serious death or injury.
The industry communicates among themselves to learn
how it can be prevented in the future.
Some parks even shut down similar rides until the
incident has been addressed internally.
When they do happen, whether it's at our park or another
park, we'll interact with the operators and the owners
of the rides and we'll find out what happened when it
comes out. And until then, sometimes we have similar or
the same rides at different parks. Our rides will always
be shut down until we know what happened.
If there was an accident, unless we know what happened
and address it within our own park, we would never
open a ride like that.
So, yes, we would always learn from the accidents,
changes. If there's a change to be made, we'll
make it immediately. It's not something we would not
do.
Overall, many parks see safety as an important
investment.
We operate 27 theme parks in three countries.
We see about 28 million guests, visitors, a year.
And last year we delivered 157 million rides safely
with 50,000 employees.
You know, we spend multi million dollars a year on
safety. Safety is truly built into everything that
we do in every facet.