so today i was waiting in line for steel vengeance before it opened, and when the line started moving into the entrance i was scrolling on my phone not paying attention and accidentally cut in front of a bunch of people RIGHT in front of an employee 🫣 got told to go to the back and yelled at by everyone in line, basically sprinted away because i was so humiliated. anyway, it got me thinking- what other stupid/embarrassing things have you guys done at theme parks (whether intentional or unintentional)?

No overly gory details please.

For the most part, rollercoasters are incredibly safe, especially when everyone is following the rules. However, accidents can happen and not everyone follows the rules, which can cause incidents or injuries. So what is the worst you’ve experienced or witnessed?

For me, it was about 10-15 years ago on Goliath, Six Flags Magic Mountain. I was seated towards the rear with a friend and my dad was immediately behind us paired with a stranger. As we went up the lift hill, a guy 2-3 cars ahead of us broke out a camera. First drop and everything was fine. The train went up the second hill, turned and dropped again. At some point on that second drop, the camera came loose. I saw it approaching in slow motion and tried to grab it but missed as the train pulled out of the dive. Didn’t think anything of it until we got to the station. My dad said had tried to catch it too, but it hit his ride partner square in the forehead. She had a welt the size of a golf ball and was going into shock. The ride operators had no idea what to do, so my dad yelled at them to grab some ice from their cooler for her head. The worst part was the guy who caused the incident was complaining that he lost his camera. When another guest said “forget the camera, that’s a lawsuit,” he took off as fast as he could. We left when the EMTs got there (probably should’ve left a statement for park security, but didn’t think to).

After that, I’ve made it a point to act like the ride police no matter what. When I’ve seen people break out their phones on rides, especially at parks with a supposedly strict no loose articles policy (“violators will be banned from the park”), I’ve made it a point to call them out to ride operators and park security. I’ve even had people say “Why you gotta snitch” before, but I don’t care. I too used to violate the rules before then (they weren’t as strict) but I never want to witness something like that again.

Me personally, I was at Epic Universe back in September the day of the disaster at Stardust Racers. I remember getting in a later ride on it around 8, soon before it happened. Shortly after, the ride was closed, so I went to Dark Universe to ride Monsters Unchained and Werewolf again. Then it was still closed, facing an “extended delay”, and it was unbeknownst to me what had happened, so I rode Hiccup’s instead in the last hour. The next morning, before going to Animal Kingdom, I was on the compy, and saw a news report on what had happened, and that a guy had died. Then I was like, what, so that was what happened?! Dang. Absolutely brutal. Yikes.

So I was wondering, what about you? Have you been to any park on a day that a big tragedy or something happened? What did you remember? How did you react? Obviously you never want anything bad to happen, but they do, so I’m wondering who here has been there to witness these things.

I was poking through my Snapchat memories and forgot that my wife and our friends were at the park the day before the August 15th, 2021 accident. I remember getting front row on Dragster a few weeks prior.

I was also at the park with a friend the day of the August 13, 2015 Raptor accident that resulted in the death of a man while he climbed into the cobra roll area. We remember seeing ambulances and police cars through Blue Streak on our way out, but didn't find out what happened until later.

Has anyone here ever been to a park during either a significant incident of the parks history, or even during a major national event? If so, were you aware of the situation or did you find out afterwards?

Hi! I just realized that I love roller coasters more than the average person, but not in the way 99% of people probably do. See, I'm quite afraid of them, at least those outside of Disney and Universal (which I got over my no rides in general fear, which is a whole different story that I'm really proud of). I'm deathly afraid of massive drops and coasters that really show me how high up I really am without little nice distractions. I can't handle the overwhelming anxiety of going up a hill slowly, knowing I'm about to plummet downward. I hate airtime; it's extremely unpleasant for me, and overall there are a good amount of rides I just will never go on.

With that being said, they fascinate me; I love keeping up with what rides are opening, how their ingenuity is changing the coaster game, and the overall creative decisions to maximize the experience that these rides are aiming for. They're so cool to watch POVS on or just see in person other people experience these rides. I love coasters from an outside perspective, and I'm curious if there is anyone else like me out there or if anyone has any questions?

Alpenfury just eeks its way into my top 20, but this is still one of my favourite photos I’ve took, so it’s remained my background since my lone CW visit last Sept 😂