June 30, 2008
Some Rides at Coney Island Unsafe, Inspector Says
An amusement park ride inspector warns that some of the rides at Coney Island are so dangerous they should not be open for business. Last summer a man died after surgery to heal vertebrae fractured on the Cyclone, but the rides now targeted by “amusement-safety consultant” Walt Reiss don’t include the famous wooden roller coaster.
Reiss, who has previously trained New York City ride inspectors, tells the Post that the “Swingout” ride is so unsafe that, "if I had to sign my name to this ride, I would shut it down." The owner of the company in charge of the ride says he’s passed several inspections with no problems. But Reiss also deems the Scrambler and Ring of Fire rides to be potential deathtraps; the former because safety bars are badly aligned, the latter because of “serious problems” with support beams.
The three temporary rides are all on land owned by Joe Sitt’s Thor Equities, which is pushing a controversial plan to transform Coney Island into a year-round amusement, retail and hotel destination. In its current form, the plan would turn over management of all the rides to a single "world class operator."
Photo courtesy PabsV.
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Shoot the Freak is potentially dangerous for freaks.
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"Mop and bucket man to the exit of the Nauseator. Mop and bucket man to the exit of the Nauseator."
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I'm a big Coney fan/ Sitt detractor, but it looks like they only inspected the new temporary rides. Wonder how all the other rides rate...
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I never trust those temporary/carnival style rides. Those things always look about to fall apart. And for friends of mine that say "oh well that's the fun of it", tell that to the girl I knew who dislocated her spine on one of those mission to mars centrifugal force rides. No fun at all!
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Big surprise?
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This is all just a game for Joe Sitt to say 'see I brought rides in but they don't make any money, no one rides them and todays rides that fit in Coney Island aren't safe' so he can sway the city into passing and changing the zoning to allow shopping malls. It's all a game playing into peoples stupidity and naive nature.
This is almost as calculated as Sitt saying we shouldn't have school buses on this land, yet they sit on his land. He thinks everyone is dumb.
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Chances are the other inspectors weren't doing jack. In the industry we call it 'drive by inspection.' You show up, walk around, and leave in 20 minutes.
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They could do like Blarney Castle in Ireland last time I was there: put up a sign that says you enter at your own risk. Ha. Now that's honesty!
Fair enough, I thought, too.
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Dollars to donuts say the inspector is a stooge of Thor Equities.
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that rollercoaster is the scariest thing on the planet. Just because you feel you might die. You can't buy that.
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I think these look legitimately unsafe. coney island needs a mega make over.
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File this one under "No shit, Sherlock." That being said, the danger of the rides is what I love about Coney Isl. If I wanted safer rides, I'd go to Six Flags.
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I am so sick of this. All you guys do is sit around and read the Post and then regurgitate it with exclamation marks as post in your blog. Sorry, but this blog is no longer relevant. Regardless of the truth (or lack of) in any of these articles, the real story here is that there is a campaign of misinformation going on - and the media is complicit. If you really want to know what's going on at Coney Island, go to gowanuslounge. He seems to be able to separate the issues from the crap printed in the Post. And Gothamist should know better.
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Quite naturally The Post would cover this story. They love scandal and could care less about the future of Coney Island. Something's in the works.
There have been stories about injuries and accidents at Six Flags and at Disney.
Sitt can go sit on a tack and rotate.
I'd pay a dollar for that!