What the F Happened??? Ohio State Ride Fireball

[OldBillParticipant]

I’m thinking slow hydraulic leak. The bench seat definitely hit bottom which fractured the supports, so why it hit on that particular swing after hours(?) of safe operation is the puzzle.

Those rides use hydraulics much like truck mounted boom cranes to position the benches for loading, set up the swinging motion, brake the motion to a stop, and position for unloading. If the hoses and/or fittings associated with the arm holding that one bench had a leak, that arm would “droop” in relation to the others. If the leak were slow enough, the ride could move through several cycles before the “droop” was enough to allow the bench to hit the loading platform.

It’s going to be the result of several problems, it always is a result of several problems. I don’t think it’s going to be metal fatigue, cracks, or anything along those lines because the ride clearly contacted itself. Metal problems would have let go at any time during the swing and not just at the bottom.

Do not date. Do not impregnate. Do not co-habitate. Above all, do not marry. Reclaim and never again surrender your personal sovereignty.

[SamsquanchParticipant 4226]

Just by the video it looks like the seats came into contact with the red bars that were below it. It breaks off the arm at the bottom and then you see it rotate and see the missing seats at the left of the screen when it swings back up.

I’ve been to the fair several times, rode the rides as a kid but when I got older I never went on them because of this kind of s~~~. It happens almost every year at these Ohio fairs. I think a couple years ago a kiddie roller coaster de-railed and sent people flying.

When these rides are put up, taken down, then transported about once every 2 weeks, it makes sense that the structures wouldn’t be stable. Just like a manufactured home VS. a home that is built from the ground up. Places like Cedar Point and Kings Island are safe, don’t trust fair rides tho.

I’ve also seen Ted Nugent 3 times at the Ohio St. Fair haha

Here’s a slow motion shot of it

[AutoliteParticipant]

OldBill wrote:

It’s going to be the result of several problems, it always is a result of several problems. I don’t think it’s going to be metal fatigue, cracks, or anything along those lines because the ride clearly contacted itself.

That’s quite possible. It ‘sounds’ like the carriage smashed into or contacted something but I just couldn’t see it clearly enough to be sure. It does sound like something collided with something else though…

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmonton/edmonton-k-days-fire-ball-ride-closed-1.4223937

[SamsquanchParticipant 4226]

Autolite wrote:

OldBill wrote:

It’s going to be the result of several problems, it always is a result of several problems. I don’t think it’s going to be metal fatigue, cracks, or anything along those lines because the ride clearly contacted itself.

That’s quite possible. It ‘sounds’ like the carriage smashed into or contacted something but I just couldn’t see it clearly enough to be sure. It does sound like something collided with something else though…

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmonton/edmonton-k-days-fire-ball-ride-closed-1.4223937

Yea I was able to see it on the slow motion part. You see the bench rotate (flip backwards) after it collides with the red horizontal beams. I’m not an engineer and not going to pretend to know about the physics or how these things operate, just going by what the video shows. But Old Bill makes sense, if there was a slow leak, it would cause the arm to sag and eventually hit the beams.

[SamsquanchParticipant 4226]

The kid who got killed had just joined the Marines

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2017/07/27/ohio-state-fair-ride-victim-recently-enlisted-in-marines.html

[KevinStylesParticipant 2580]

Have you seen how fast they put those things together? Here in this little podunk small town they have a carnival every year, those guys show up mid-day one day and are open for business by the evening of the next. That’s always been a huge safety concern to me, who’s really checking these rides out, who’s checking allthe nuts/n/bults are tight, who’s checking the metal for aging and stress.

In the case of Ohio state fairs ride, it seems like the sound is either the seat hitting something on the ground which breaks it lose or it’s the sound of the metal breaking as the G force picks up on the up swing . Those are my two guesses.

[SandalsParticipant 4253]

So it’s looking like the arm got ripped off by the red bar. To me it doesn’t look like the seat is drooping. If it was drooping, how could they design a ride where there could be a risk of the seat coming into contact with the metal bars if the seat drooped or the load was not balanced? Did the control arm not raise high enough?

[Author]

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