Updated September 24, 2021 9.5K votes 1.7K voters 62.0K views
Voting Rules
Vote up the rides that seem too dangerous to have ever been approved.
As the name implies, amusements park rides are meant to exhilarate and thrill. To experience the most notoriously scary rides, people are willing to wait for hours in line, just so they can spend less than a minute getting whipped around at high speeds. However, when rogue operators decide to take the riders' amusement into their own hands, what often results are some pretty dangerous theme park rides.
Some deadly amusement park rides seem so slapdash that one has to wonder how anyone ever thought they sounded like fun. Loony ideas such as a human catapult or a 16-story drop with no harness usually end with disastrous accidents that seem totally out of place in the synthetically happy atmosphere of an amusement park.
While such incidents are rare, some reckless theme park rides have led to serious injuries, and even deaths. While the rider is occasionally at fault, more often than not, a ride's issues stem from faulty construction and outlandish design choices. If your water park has a ride nicknamed "The Grave Pool," you know you're doing something wrong.
1
1,134 VOTES
Middlemoor Water Park's Human Trebuchet Shot A Student To His Death
A ride that looks like a giant catapult — and that is capable of firing humans more than 75 feet into the air — should sound like a terrible idea to most people. However, that didn’t stop Richard Wicks and David Aitkenhead from building their human trebuchet in Somerset, UK.
The contraption used a series of weights to shoot riders into a safety net located off in the distance. The duo charged a £20 ticket price, and managed to rope in roughly 50 riders before serious tragedy struck. Although people were regularly injured on the ride, the creators continued on until a student was killed after he failed to reach the safety net.
1,134 votes
2
844 VOTES
Revere Beach's Derby Racer Broke Riders' Bones, Often Killing Them
Built in 1911, the original Derby Racer came hot on the heels of America's first roller coasters, which perhaps explains its notoriously poor safety record. During its 25 years of operation, there were reports of several deaths and dozens of serious injuries. The Boston Daily Globe reported numerous instances of riders being thrown from cars, their bodies crumpling upon impact. One victim broke almost every bone in his body, and another fractured her skull.
Because roller coasters were less standardized in the early 1900s, there were fewer regulations in place to ensure that patrons could safely enjoy rides. The deadly coaster was eventually demolished in 1936 by the Massachusetts Supreme Court, as it was considered too dangerous to remain in operation. However, the park built a second Derby Racer coaster in 1938, that was mysteriously shut down in the late '40s. With the original Derby Racer's macabre history, it's a wonder that park-goers weren't lining up to have their bones broken on its namesake.
844 votes
3
861 VOTES
Going Down Action Park's Alpine Slide Was Like Getting Dragged Across Concrete
The alpine slide at New Jersey's Action Park made riders travel down the side of the mountain in a sled. As was the case with many of the park's rides, questionable design choices made the slide unexpectedly lethal.
The track was made predominantly of rough concrete, giving it the potential to shred skin and cause serious injury upon impact. To make things worse, the sleds would often jump from the poorly-built track, and the only thing to stop renegade sleds from flying off a mountain were a few shoddily-placed hay bales.
Many of the sleds were broken, leaving patrons with no way to slow down while they were on the ride. In the most gruesome of scenarios, a lack of regulation allowed visitors to use the ride while wearing bathing suits, which lead to them having almost no protection from abrasions and scrapes. Unsurprisingly, the park was forced to shut its doors in 1996.
861 votes
4
959 VOTES
Six Flags Great Adventure's Haunted Castle Was A Flaming Death Trap
In 1984, the Haunted Castle attraction at Six Flags Great Adventure in New Jersey erupted in flames, killing eight teenagers, and injuring seven others. While the fire was an accident, the building was not designed with fire safety in mind, which made it difficult for riders to recognize the danger they were in.
According to the testimonies of several fire safety officials, the building did not feature any smoke detectors or fire extinguishers, and was built using materials that were highly flammable. As a result, when flames erupted inside, many guests assumed that it was all part of the ride. To make matters worse, several of the building materials were toxic when heated, which caused some victims to suffocate from inhaling debilitating fumes.
England's The Smiler made headlines in 2015 after an operator error led to two cars colliding. As a result of the accident, several guests suffered life-changing injuries, including leg amputations.
Shockingly, this was not the first ride-related incident to occur at Alton Towers. Since The Smiler's launch in 2013, the roller coaster suffered a variety of malfunctions and problems, such as sudden stops. Whenever the ride broke down, riders were left stranded on the track, which was composed of 14 loops. Additionally, it wasn't uncommon for debris to fall from the cars while the ride was in use. Another incident ended with four injured after the guide wheels fell off one of the cars, landing on the heads of onlookers.
The Japanese ride Fujin Raijin II suffered a serious malfunction in 2007, that led to the death of one teenager and injured 19 other riders. After one of the cars' axles broke, the coaster derailed, sending its riders toppling to the ground.
According to investigators who examined the ride after the crash, most of the other cars had similar problems, and the majority of the ride's axles were cracked. It later came out that the axles had not been properly inspected, changed, or repaired for 15 years, making the accident seem like an inevitability.
