What Really Happened on Mindbender at Galaxyland June 14th 1986?
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- Опубликовано: 3 окт 2024
- This accident is probably the most well known in amusement ride history, but just what caused it to be as bad as it was and what has changed in its wake?
Submit a ride related injury to ARID: forms.gle/Aysk...
Savage Coasters provided most of the offride footage in this video, check out his channel here: / @savagecoasters
Sources:
web.archive.or...
-News article about the incident
bestedmontonmal...
-article about the incident
rcdb.com/193.htm
-RCDB page for the ride
apnews.com/8be...
-Period news article about the incident
www.ultimatero...
-Article about Schwarzkopf in the mid 80s
• 1986 Roller Coaster Cr...
-News report used in my video
groups.google....
-What remains of accident report
Discord Users who provided Photos/videos:
RandomPotato
KWFB (NL2 Coaster)
Schwarzkopf Fanboy
Join our discord: / discord
Shoutout to the Mindbender crew for actually noticing the sound and calling down matinence TWICE. They were the only ones who knew something was wrong.
Kennywood Fanboy love Kennywood
The maintenance crew is 100% at fault. They were told TWICE that the thing was making a noise. They could have removed it from service easily.
It's baffling that maintenance didn't stick around for a couple rides with passengers..
@@arsonfly Even the lazy procrastinator in me would have done that.
True
It literally takes 5 brain cells to realize that the sound was because there was weight in the coaster. 3heads
Ikr. Like where the weighs or dummy's to test with?
Exactly what I said
@@candace17____69 rly? didnt realize I copied your comment
Lizard_OW lol I’m saying I said it to myself out loud, you’re good
Those guys who heard the sound are 5Head
As an enthusiast, I would MUCH rather “suffer” the closing down of a ride for inspection or maintenance and have it come back with nothing wrong than get back on it with an uncertainty.
Yeah same
I’d rather not even go on it than be in a incident like this
That happened for me with this very coaster! The first year I was at the park they had shut it down for maintenance/check ups. I was disappointed but glad to see how often they check on it and got to ride it a year later
sadly when i worked for a ride, i had so many visitors yelling at me when there was a downtime and I'm just like uhh it's for your safety? and i don't even own the ride haha
they should let a few cars just fly off the tracks in front of the visitors so they appreciate the maintenance.
yup. I waited two hours once to get on the Steel Curtain at Kennywood (Pitt) and they shut it down for maintenance. some woman started cussing out the attendant to try and get him to let her on anyway. If you want to die for a ride, be my guest, but I'd rather have a safe ride and a longer wait
me: watching something completely unrelated to roller coasters
youtube recommend: what happened on the Mindbender at Galaxyland on June 14th 1986?
me: what DID happen on the Mindbender at Galaxyland on June 14th 1986?
Same.
same here lmao, i was watching videos about rabbit island in japan before this
Lol I was just watching stuff about ww1 and ww2
I think I was about to watch some True Crime
You and me both.
I like the cool animations you use to show what happened, they are way more accurate than Tomo news animation.
I believe he's using No Limits 2
Tomo really drives me nuts sometimes.
Tomo is one of the thing I hate most
Holy shit I forgot abt tomonews, youtube stopped recommending their channel and now its dead, thts crazyy
Tomo news is garbage
I worked loading on this coaster. This accident nearly happened a second time. I was loading guests one day when I heard a strange whistling coming from the train. A high pitched whistling. We went through the same procedures as you stated in the video. With maintenance saying and doing the exact same thing. The only difference was that I was relieved for my break, told the guy replacing me NOT to load guests until they fixed the train. They were saying that they couldn’t find the problem, and to just run it.
I went straight to the GMs office, just barging in. Told him what was happening, and as I spoke to him, the maintenance manager called the GM to complain about me not letting guests on the train.
My GM told him to shut it down and find the problem. It was down for the rest of the day, as it turns out that it was the same issue that caused the first accident. Except it was a failed wheel assembly in the front car.
Of course nothing was ever written down, it was completely swept under the rug.
This should be the top comment!! You stopped a second disaster.
Wow go you for sticking to your guns & saving people’s lives that day. It’s disgusting that maintenance would think oh no idea what the problem is so let’s just let people ride and if they die we’ll find out what the problem is then when we’re forced to🙃
Parks need more people like you to advocate for the general publics safety well done 👏🏼
This comment is highly underrated. You are a true hero. ❤❤❤
This happened yesterday on a ride in Stockholm made by the same manufacturer. 1 person died and 2 are in the icu
the fact that this ride was still open for so many years is beyond me
I love how you don’t exaggerate the accidents or say that the ride is a dangerous ride. You just tell the true and honest story. Well done.
That's because, when operated and maintained properly, roller coasters are not dangerous rides.
David Frischknecht Exactly, that’s what the GP do not understand.
👏👌🏼👌🏼👌🏼👌🏼👏👏👏
@@davidfrischknecht8261 I remember Werner Stengel saying "once you have reached the park's parking lot, the most dangerous part of the day is over", and just going by general numbers he is absolutely right.
And out of the few accidents that do happen, many (of course not this one) can be blamed on riders not following the posted rules. If someone climbs the fence to get into a running coaster's infield and gets hit by a passing train it's clearly not the ride's fault.
"I love how you don’t exaggerate the accidents or say that the ride is a dangerous ride. You just tell the true and honest story. Well done.
"
Welcome to the GP2E channel
Scary fact, my parents and I are from Edmonton (where the coaster is), and my mom told me she rode the coaster on the day of the accident, hours before it happened. I can’t believe how lucky she was to be okay. Needless to say, she’s never ridden it since.
someone around where i live rode the coaster that day too, its really unsetteling
My moms ex brother in law was one of the investigators of the accident. Scared me into going on it as a little kid
@@cynthiaswanson498 That honestly sounds terrifying. If I had ridden the coaster the day it happened, I'd likely not be able to sleep for weeks.
My mom is from Edmonton
Tell her to ride it
The ride is safe
The chances of that happening again are slim
The ride operators did everything Maintenance was the problem
Maintenance employees hands are often tied by management. They want the rides turning and people paying at all costs. Unfortunately the maintenance worker is usually the scapegoat.
@Alexander Shambach You should. Cutting corners and increasing the risk of an accident is not worth the potential PR disaster a major accident would cause. Roller coasters overall are unbelievably safe.
Wrong, the ride operators shouldn’t have continued the send the yellow carts if they suspected a problem
Your likes are now 666 have a devil comment
@Alexander Shambach the USA has perfected this by making their entire health care system run by large money-hungry corporations.
I was there for my cousin's birthday the day this happened. We got off the ride - the ride after ours was the one that crashed. We had already walked away to another area when it happened, but that crash and screaming isn't something you forget. I'm nearly 50 now and still remember.
Man that must have freaked you out
Was any mental mealth support given/did they reach out to witnesses at the time? This is something I'm curious about as you always hear about the incident but never the aftermath.
@@kloeeh5389 No idea. I was a kid & that is pretty beyond what a kid cares about. Probably something you can check in archives, but 1980s Canada, highly unlikely.
@@shaldana yeah, kids were tough back then
My mom was next in line to board the yellow car
At least the ride operators were vigilant enough to notice that something was wrong with the ride. I think it's crazy that the ride was inspected twice AFTER hearing the noise, and yet the fault still wasn't discovered. This tragedy could have, and should have been easily avoided. Whoever inspected the ride never should have given them the go ahead to keep running it until a full inspection of the ride could be completed. If the ride operators were concerned enough to call maintenance not once, but TWICE about the noise then that should have been enough of an indication to maintenance that something was seriously wrong. I'm sorry for everyone who was impacted by this tragedy.
Elizabeth Frantes True, not to mention maintenance should’ve and would’ve known that the wheel assembly was loose if they’d been doing proper maintenance on that part of the ride in the first place.
I think it’s crazy that it never crossed their mind that it had to do something with how much weight was in the train, or rather didn’t try putting weight dummies to test
@@samuraiabstinencepatrol6312 ikr, that was the first thing that immediately came to mind when hearing the story
Well we have definitely learned from this.
I heard some rides were tested with water tanks representing riders, how come they don't use them for maintenance tests? Personally it would make sense to me to test a ride when inspecting first empty, followed up by a weighted test. Of course this won't help every problem but this always seemed to make sense to me, but this kind of poor maintenance is just straight up shocking. Now I also start to see why sometimes festival rides break down, maintaining is such a pain in the ass but it HAS to be done...
“There was never another similar accident on Schwarzkopf coaster…”
Me: Oh that’s go-
“…that is until 2019”
Me:until WHAT
Insert the record skip and me frantically googling WTF happened! ;-)
Yeah this incident happened in La feria de Chapultepec in Mexico city, worst thing about this is that this incident its just one of the many that happened there but La feria always hid them from the authorities to keep the place running without making any maintenance to the rides, that place was shady af.
The_Jimmy_Turner that was me as well
You mean Shworshkoff (00:37) instead of Schwarzkopf :D
OMG LMAO I was thinking the same thing !!!!
Hearing about these incidents and what caused them is super interesting to me, as an aviation electronics tech. We have a saying that "the laws of aviation maintenance are written in blood", and it seems to be similar for the amusement park industry.
Would you ever consider doing a video on how incidents impacted the mindset around ride operation, and how that mindset has evolved over time?
You could probably generalize it to all maintenance and safety protocols being written in blood. Someone pushes down from above to slacken standards in the name of saving money while ground crew take an increasingly relaxed approach to existing standards because they don't feel a need to be uptight about it. Then a major accident happens, people get killed or severely injured and suddenly the importance of proper safety and maintenance becomes painfully visceral.
My dad is an aircraft mechanic. Never skimps on anything because he and his crew know that every rule is there for a reason.
Interesting idea, I will look into it!
That is a descent idea
ya
When I was a little kid I went on a continuous loop ride at the state fair and the ride operator didn’t put my lap bar down far enough, the ride held upside down at the top and I started to slide out of the restraint thankfully some teenage girls in the next car were able to reach just far enough to help hold me in and we were all yelling to stop the ride, I was pretty young at the time and didn’t say a word when I got off but the girls did they yelled at the operator then told my parents what happened, it took me up to late my freshman year to finally go on a roller coaster and I balled my eyes out standing in line thankfully I rode the ride and realized it wasn’t nearly as bad as say skateboarding or motocross which are my main sports, now I love roller coasters!
Freshman, as in high school, or freshman, as in college?
Jeff Chorneyko high school
Ok
How- how can you go on roller coasters?! Like the large ones?! As- oh yeah it is summer so I guess freshman summer year of highschool I will still only ride roller coasters made for kids. Like the small dragon one at fairs.
@@Guidingsonar idk I ride motocross and I use to skate a lot and I guess I just told myself that those things were way scarier and more dangerous and ever since then I haven’t been scared of one since I love them now
Fun fact: I worked there in 2003 and at that time the park still had the old mind bender cars from the 80’s. In fact you could see them on a ledge at the end of the ride right after it brakes. Not sure if they are still there now but that always seemed kinda creepy to me. That being said the park is now absolutely militant about safety especially on the mindbender. They are extremely picky about who is allowed to work in it and you had to have worked in the park for years before they’d consider training you. They also close it down every 1-2 hours for a complete and thorough mechanical inspection. The guy who survived the accident has spoken out about how the mall handled things if anyone is interested, there’s a news clip on RUclips. Not surprising since the Ghermezian family aren’t super nice and it was a nightmare when they visited the park because we all had to work overtime to clean the park before their visit which they didn’t even notice or care about. They also have refused to put a memorial plaque or anything up in memory of those who died in the accident despite being asked to do so by several people out of respect. That never sat well with me.
vinnie vee even Batman the ride in GA has a baseball cap hanging out the fence and idk if that was an attendee that put that there in remembrance or if it was the park. But I was standing there, and I was like omg that’s so sad... but I still rode it. I get both sides. Like maybe the owners don’t want people to not ride the ride because of that. But... I also get that the parents and families want a memorial. I’m sure something could be done tasteful but oh well.
At my home park, a rollercoaster got replaced with a new one and they shoved one of the old trains into the roof where you enter the ride. They put unused track as decoration and it looks like an accident happened there. The coaster is called powder keg and it's at silver dollar city
@@RedHotMessResell I feel like that isn't necessary w BTR - it was all on him hopping the fence on a coaster where the cars hang from the track that's pretty dumb...
Jslim Threenine I mean. Exactly. So my thought was.... did a friend do it? Or did an employee do it? I don’t know.
There’s precedent for Schwarzkopf’s having hourly or similar maintenance, when the Bullet was at Flamingo Land it used to run a ‘morning’ and ‘afternoon’ session with a shutdown in the middle to inspect the track as the ride was so forceful
"Hey there's something wrong here"
"nah it's fine"
"no really, there's something wrong here"
"just run the damn thing"
c'mon ride maintenance.. at least find some dummy to load up the train and test it with some weight .-.
They could even check out the car without weighted dummies. They disregarded the operators, and I feel that is a big no-no. (I don't work with amusement rides, but I work with machinery)
Operators, especially ones that have worked for years, know what the machine is supposed to sound like when a heavy product (in this case people) are on it. Machines, no matter how well manufactured, break down over time when dealing with weight and moving and stopping consistently. Sometimes, they break down during their job. When machines start to break down, if it isn't visibly seen it is definitely heard. This is where operators are very useful. They may not know how to fix it, or even exactly WHERE the problem is, but they can definitely hear something is wrong.
The maintenance crew did not hear the operators out, even when they came to them a second time. They didn't think about the weight of the people being an influence on the train. After the second time of being paged, they should've pulled the train out no questions asked. If they pulled the train out and inspected it, they would've seen the problem.
@@vincetravis8701 I agree completely, but it's obvious that maintenance didn't believe the operators here.
Still, even if they didn't believe it and still wanted that train to keep moving, the could have modified their test of the track by adding weight.
If the first time the tested it and it didn't seem like anything was wrong, they then load people on and the operators heard it again, why did maintenance run the test again without modifying the test by adding weight. There wasn't going to be any difference between two of the exact same test.
It’s sort of difficult to just find water-filled human-sized dummies just on hand, y’know.
I’m no expert in anything related to this, but maybe that’s why they weight test rides nowadays. This was back in the 80s, and this accident is very likely one of the biggest catalysts to upgrading ride safety procedures. It’s a horrible thing to happen, but how much worse would things be if they never changed them?
@@Oridemic well then they should have taken the car off the track till they could test it with weights.
I'm surprised this happened so quickly after it opened
noted in the vid the manufacturer was in financial trouble so likely corners cut.
@@Revkor It wasn't that. Despite the bankruptcy, Schwarzkopf was making the best coasters in the world at the time. Many coasters from Schwarzkopf during that time period are still around today and considered some of the best classic steel coasters in operation. They are incredibly safe. The real issue was maintenance not doing their job, and properly servicing the ride. Also the park not hiring a good translator.
I was working at a store in West Edmonton Mall when this happened. I remember my Mom called me late at night when she heard about the accident (it happened later in the evening). I thought it was odd she would call me that late. And then I realized, she knew I enjoyed that ride and sometimes went with friends after work. She was making sure I was safe at home. Two of the people who died were a woman and her fiancé. The families buried them side by side. If you look carefully you can still see a small piece missing from the concrete and a small smear of yellow paint where the last car hit the pillar.
That's haunting. You would think that they would repair that to not leave a trace of evidence of such an unfortunate occurrence. I would not want to have that around.
Three ppl died. The man who survived the fall (rod chayko) had a friend who fell & died too. The documentary is on RUclips with over 1mil views
@@flipk6486 Can you provide a link? How long is the video?
Maybe a maintenance person should’ve stayed there and watched, after they reopened the ride.
AJSSPACEPLACE underrated comment, I assumed that would’ve been something the maintenance would’ve done
One of my dad's former employees was operating the ride when the accident happened. I would have been very curious to hear it from his point of view but I never pried because apparently I heard he still blames himself for the tragedy and suffers from severe PTSD still to this day.
I really do wish they put a plaque or a memorial bench for the people who lost their lives that day somewhere in Galaxy Land. My heart goes out to the families affected.
Rip
I don't think people or their family want their death seemingly commercialized in a theme park.
Nicely done video, as someone who ran that coaster for years it is definitely one of the better videos about the incident, however;
1) The report (Called “Mall Coaster Inquiry”) is in the Law Library at the University of Alberta, not sure if its anywhere else but it is there
2) An important part not mentioned is that maintenance noticed that the bolts holding the bogey onto the train would come loose, a lot, and that led to a lot of time tightening them so they decided (despite it being contraindicated in the manual - but in a part that hadn’t been translated at that point) to put “Loctite” on the threads, so on inspection the bogey appeared to be held securely in place. However the vibrations from normal ride operation stripped away the threads until the accident happened, which is one of the reasons that on visual inspection the trains looked “fine” until the accident occurred.
3) Comments surrounding removing a train from the track and moving it into the maintenance sides, not sure if its with all Scwarzkopf coasters, but the process to move a train from the active track was not easy, which doesn’t make it right, but I’m sure played a role in the decision made
Thanks for the extra info!
Hadn't been translated yet. Well, who needs the WHOLE manual? What could possiblie go wrang?
They super glued that crap?! Yipes
It’s at the u of a??? I’ll have to check it out
"Hey I think there's something wrong"
"Huh it doesn't act up when I'm here."
"Yeah but when I run the yellow car, it makes a bunch of noise."
"Well it's silent without any people"
"Yeah about that, I think it might be pe-"
"Run the ride it'll be fine"
If this video doesn't end with someone in jail I swear...
I can’t tell you how many times this accident popped up on the internet
It's over 9000.
Its very very interesting to me i cant stop watchinv all these and my mum is so confused that i am still brave enough at a young age.
One thing I really appreciate about this channel is that explains what went wrong, but doesn’t try to scare you. Explains the accidents where usually one of and preventable, that the safety procedures have improved, and it’s very unlikely to happen again.
I remember living in Edmonton while this accident happened. As soon as the ride opened again my older brother bet me to ride the Mindbender. I rode it and I remember being absolutely terrified.
I can only imagine. I've been on it several times, it's fun.
That's the ONLY reason I wanted to ride it. It's a double thrill ride. I rode on it with my mom on a dare on Christmas Day 2004!
The worst we suffered was minor bruising from our necks being battered from side to side by the loops but still it's a hell of a thill ride!
Ian, If you think the Mindbender is hard on your neck, ride in the rear car of the blue train, when they have the car facing backwards! It takes neck trauma to the next level, when you can't prepare for a sharp curve!!
This ride has never had an issue since 1986. People ride this ride due to the fact 3 people died. People what to ride it for that reason.
0:36 "Schworschkoff" :D
I know "rz" and and "pf" are hard to pronounce but this one was hilariously off :D
"That's a topic for a future video" well start working on it lol
here's a quick summary lol La Feria, in Mexico City, was the first theme park in Latin America but the park was mostly owned by the government, but it being a corrupt one they just turned a blind eye towards safety (I always prefered going to Six Flags, all the rides on the park felt cheap and unsafe) on september 28th the last car of the Chimera, the same model as this one, snapped off the rails slamming into a wall, two of the four passangers died on impact, another one had craneal fractures and the last one walked off with cuts and bruises, unfortunately there isnt much more info since it is a park ran basically by the government so censoring is found by the dozen, the accident also revealed that another accident took the life of a teen some years back which the park covered up, anyway, the government basically said it was poor maintenance combined with the record that this model has (that record being the accident on this video) and shut down the park, sad to see that corruption took many lifes and also a big historical jewel from us, now the park is just sitting there abandoned, getting more and more covered in grafity, there was supposed to be auction for the park but it was gonna take place this month so that´s not happening.
@@MultiPaco06 thank you for the info
@@MultiPaco06 the goverment sold the park in the 90s is now owned by a private company called ventura, the auction didn't took place because venture claims that the government cant sell the park so there's a whole legal battle as to weather or not the government is legally allowed to sell something that isn't theirs
A very similar accident occured on another Schwarzkopf coaster today. Jetline at Gröna Lund in sweden derailed earlier today in almost exactly the same manner except it was the first car and not the last car loosing parts of the wheel assembly. Current reports are 1 dead, 3 seriously injured and 6 persons with minor injuries. At least two occupants where thrown from the coaster (likely from the first car). Jetline still only has lap restraints and lacks shoulder restraints which would probably have saved everyone on board.
No one was thrown from the first car. It as a boy sitting in it by himself. He put up a video on Tiktok.
Great video. It's interesting that accidents like this are one of the reasons fatal accidents at parks are very rare. I guess you could call this one the Titanic of roller coasters, since it changed things to be more safety-oriented just like how the Titanic disaster changed ocean travels to be more safety-oriented.
Me who's actually never heard of this coaster before: hmm what *did* happen on mindbender at galaxy land
You should do a video on the Big Dipper accident, at Battersea Park. It is the deadliest rollercoaster accident, resulting in the death of 5 people. Most whom, were children.
I'd watch it. One of the simpler coaster disasters though. No anti-rollbacks and a rope lift snap.
And there is NOT enough information about it. I’ve looked and looked.
I used to live in Battersea and went to fairgrounds there for 14 years. I had no idea.
why am I wathcing this? I don't even own a rollercoaster.
You dumb idiot nobody does
@@SatansFire r/woooosh
@@onlyvaluknow r/wooosh yourself idiot its called irony, no shIT NOBODY DOES.
i'd only heard murmurs of the mindbender accident, despite living in Edmonton all my life. interesting to finally hear what happened.
Interestingly, I live very close to Edmonton myself, and had never heard of it until I came across it online.
Same here, I live in BC and went to Edmonton on a school trip and actually rode this coaster. Had I known the full details I probably wouldn't have ridden it
I live in edmonton too and when I was younger we would ride the coaster and try and freak each other out. “Oh can you see that finger? They never cleaned it up after the accident!"
@@EDDIELANE I thought I was the only weirdo who did that. I also go and stand under the loop on the bridge and watch the roller coaster roar around me. Every. Single. Time. I visit WEM... Well that phase anyway... I'm more of a Phase IV kinda guy especially now that Aurora moved in! ;-)
I was a small child and kind of remember it, but my older friends remember it well. It was down for about 6 mounths after with a big ass wall or partion separating it from the rest of the park. The rest of the park was still in operation. It was a big deal for the city at the time. It still kind is.
I grew up in Edmonton and my step-dad treated one of the victims of this accident. As I was born in ‘85 though, I never knew the details of this accident, just that it had come off the track and slammed into the concrete. Thanks for this informative video!
Car derails and train can't make the loop? Sounds like Final Destination!
Guess where they got the idea from... Truth is stranger than fiction after all! (Also my favourite of the Final Destination's FYI...)
This was actually my first large roller coaster I ever rode when I was like 14. I was terrified of coasters before this, but riding it changed me into an overnight coaster fan.
However my dad wisely didn't tell me about the accident beforehand. I'm glad he didn't, because there is no way in hell I would've gone on it if I knew that beforehand.
Granted, this was 2004, it was safe as any coaster by that point. But that wouldn't have meant shit to my child brain.
ToP tEn mOsT DAnGerouS CoaSTerS
Mr. S Number 1: GateKeeper. GateKeeper is a ride at Cedar Point in Sandusky, Ohio. It is over 900 feet tall and has 37 inversions. It also doesn’t have any restraints at all. While on GateKeeper, riders must grab on to the seats and hold on for their lives. If you aren’t careful, you might lose your head to the giant keyholes that the ride goes through.
tHeSe RiDeS cAn EvAlUaTe In DeAtH
gUyS dO nOt RiDe ThEsE
@@alexbernath3965 🤣
I still love riding this coaster. Its a blast. And still makes me smile each and everytime. They made it safer lol you should ride it now more than ever
Same thing happened again. Stockholm, Sweden, June 2023.
Thanks for this video. Everyone else just says stuff like “poor translation of manual from German to English” when there is so much more too it.
I can’t count the amount of people I’ve met who either knew someone or they themselves claimed they were in the line up for the next ride.
About 100 in these comments or parents who were about to board the train lol
Nah but fr my uncle was at galaxy land the day it happened he had nothing to do with the mindbender tho
It’s a shame such a horrible accident occurred. Even though it’s a great coaster (top 4 in Canada imo) many people I know refuse to ride it because of the accident. Lots of people watch it, but it rarely has a line unless it’s a weekend. I’ve gotten around 5 zen rides on it. I’m glad the park didn’t remove it following the accident, but I’m concerned for it’s future given the fact that its sister coaster suffered a similar accident, just because it already has bad PR (and it’s OTSRs are painful).
Anyways great video. Btw it also runs the backwards car in summer. That’s when I rode it.
It was a pretty big right of passage when I was growing up in Edmonton (mid to late 90s). Many a summer was spent riding it as many times as I could.
The pay per ride aspect is probably the main deterrent
@@sarahbeastI think it still iss
Don’t think the mall will ever get rid of it. People come to this mall alone to ride the ride. Sometimes when the park is not full or have a lot of people in it they will. Not have it opened or most likely the park has the employability’s switching the rides every 15 min, so one operator is operating two rides, just switching
@@crystalbrown3728 they did
I’m fascinated by rollercoaster, but the funny thing is, I can’t even be near them, the noise rollercoasters make, makes me extremely sensitive and triggers my panic attacks (I think it’s called sensory overload?) I still like learning about how they work or mishaps that happen / how they could be prevented so I always appreciate your videos !
Back in high school 12-15 years ago (during a rollercoaster phase) I actually owned a book on Werner Stengel which contained a chapter on this incident, which had a few more crucial details.
If I remember them all correctly:
- Apparently Schwarzkopf was under new ownership at the time, so the original founder (and close collaborator with Werner Stengel) Anton Schwarzkopf hadn't been involved - important later.
- Schwarzkopf's wheels were designed to rotate vertically on an axis close to each individual wheel during curves, like a car - which means that the horizontal width of the track needs to be slightly narrower during curves to accommodate this. According to the report, Stengel informed the new Schwarzkopf ownership about this crucial detail but they just laughed it of, perhaps out of ignorance and/or cutting costs. This meant the track would push out the wheels during every run, causing the increased wear which was noticed on all wheels of every train.
Not sure about how it was fully resolved as explained in the book, though it did try to make the point that neither Werner Stengel nor Anton Schwarzkopf were directly to blame (as the book chronicles their collaboration as part of Stengel's career & his contributions to designing rollercoasters).
I don't have the book itself anymore, unfortunately, but I should be able to find more info on it if you're interested :)
I own the same book you are talking about (It's in German of course), unfortunately it costs more than 300€ to get this book today. I don't have it at hand right now as I borrowed it to an American coaster enthusiast to assist her in her German language studies :-D But I remember quite a bit of it. The first thing was about unlocking the restraints of the fourth car. It was not that something got "torn off" as said in the video - but the car slamming into the track bent the side-mounted brake fins up which pressed on the unlock lever for the restraints. Those who are familiar with Schwarzkopf trains may remember the brake fins protruding out of the cars' sides with the unlock lever being above them. In this case the fin was angled upwards on impact causing the restraints to unlock. :(
Otherwise what you say is exactly what was written in the book, Schwarzkopf had even built a test rig before going bankrupt which was basically an axle with wheel assemblies on either end to be run over each segment of fabricated track to measure if the rail distance was adjusted properly in the bends. It later turned out that the new owners of the factory, who didn't let Anton get on the premises any more, did not use it. It makes me wonder if the track was modified after the accident.
Interestingly the book does not mention any issues with missing translations of the maintenance manuals, and honestly this sounds like a weak excuse to me. If I am an operator of such a complex machine, I either force the manufacturer to supply complete documentation in my language (which is easy if you just don't pay it fully until you get it) or if all else fails have that stuff translated by a third party. It should be possible to find at least one person in Canada who can translate from German to English... ;-)
@@Colaholiker Haha, awesome to know my brain didn't fail me on those bits :D
I do vividly remember the image from the newspaper article they printed in the book, as well as the sketches which would make it painfully easy to understand for anyone what the underlying issue was, and interestingly makes the story juicier for the recklessness of some of the parties involved.
Maybe there's a way to pass on the info so that it could potentially get added at as an update later on, fleshing out the story...
(For everyone else btw: the book was titled "Roller Coaster - Der Achterbahn-Designer Werner Stengel" by Klaus Schützmansky in German - and yes, according to Amazon it's either unavailable for 375 € for copy o.O )
@@eclipsefx Yeah, you recalled that pretty well! :)
I should have bought more of those books back in the day, when they were only 50€. I could be rich enough by now to buy my own rollercoaster :-D Some good Schwarzkopf classic probably... ;-)
@MrUsmc2085 umm,... well, ok - not sure how to interpret that.
(>As for my own career path, I simply didn't follow up on my enthusiasm in roller coasters/theme park rides back in the day, as it lost out to other, more potent interests at the time - when it was all part of an unpredictable pre-teen mind. Today's job may not be affiliated with engineering, but that's just how things are now.)
"According to the report, Stengel informed the new Schwarzkopf ownership about this crucial detail but they just laughed it of, perhaps out of ignorance and/or cutting costs. This meant the track would push out the wheels during every run, causing the increased wear which was noticed on all wheels of every train." - Sounds like bean counters deciding on engineering tasks, that they have zero knowledge of.
The way he talks about the accident in the beginning. I'm in my 30s and I've NEVER, NOT ONCE, EVER heard of this.
galaxy land is pretty much my home park, I can say from experience of riding mindbender plenty of times that this ride is extremely safe. I’ve never seen ride ops take the safety so seriously. It takes sometimes more than 10 minutes to dispatch because of the 3 different restraints used. As well as that they do all the restraints one by one and check them everytime.
Now... ;-) But yes, it's militant in style and accuracy and for a good reason. Still one hell of a thrill ride and the main reason to visit Galaxyland...
I'm 21 and terrified of almost all rides. Lately I've been having an urge to brake that fear and then I found your channel. It's been makeing me feel a lot better knowing some of the safety features. I hope once things open up again I'll be able to try out some rollercoasters!
Well now you piqued my interest what happened in 2019
La Feria, in Mexico City, was a the first theme park in Latin America but the park was mostly owned by the government, but it being a corrupt one they just turned a blind eye towards safety (I always prefered going to Six Flags, all the rides on the park felt cheap and unsafe) on september 28th the last car of the Chimera, the same model as this one, snapped off the rails slamming into a wall, two of the four passangers died on impact, another one had craneal fractures and the last one walked off with cuts and bruises, unfortunately there isnt much more info since it is a park ran basically by the government so censoring is found by the dozen, the accident also revealed that another accident took the life of a teen some years back which the park covered up, anyway, the government basically said it was poor maintenance combined with the record that this model has (that record being the accident on this video) and shut down the park, sad to see that corruption took many lifes and also a big historical jewel from us, now the park is just sitting there abandoned, getting more and more covered in grafity, there was supposed to be auction for the park but it was gonna take place this month so that´s not happening.
@@MultiPaco06 wait.... The government ran the park killed a bunch of people and then pulled the "nothing to see here" card? Thats insanity.. On the other hand if the problem was on a similar model train nearly 30 years later why was there no change in the design? Or was it a similar problem on a different type of train because still the question would be is this actually poor maintenance or a design flaw
@@MrReganomics1 They added a fifth car too, and yes, they basically did that, I mean it was all over the news but since it was "ran" by a private company (that was just a facade) they managed to close the park down and lose all connections to it
@@MrReganomics1 Thats Mexico for us my friend where the goverment prefer to wash their hands instead of accepting the responsability of something they should had control of for the safety of the public, worst thing of all of this is that after the whole place was shut down it became public the death of an employee who died months before the tragedy of La quimera took place, the family of the employee was only offered 11 thousand pesos which is equivalent of only four hundred dollars to keep their silence :/
People: why don’t you like amusement rides, are you scared or something
Me, someone’s who’s been on the infamous verrückt: haha yeah you know me, a scaredy cat lol
Did you ever fear for your safety on the Verruckt? What was your reaction to it being shut down? Also I see what you did there with the "scaredy-cat" remark and your icon...
I suppose this lead to the creation water dummies as well? Running an empty train will obviously give you a different performance than a partially or fully-loaded one. Did they have ride dummies back then and just neglected to use them? Or were dummies created later?
Janeil Nold Weighted dummies and water dummies have existed for a while before then, but mostly to make sure that there wasn’t too much stress caused by restraints. Sometimes the physics equations don’t work out just right, and they need to make sure that the ride is safe and comfortable. They still used them for the added weight effecting the ride, but didn’t quite have them on hand in case of a noise being heard that probably didn’t mean anything (which wasn’t the case here, obviously).
@@Oridemic Noises, or lack of ALWAYS mean something. Ask any mechanic.
Many coasters make noises. Any B&M hyper has a distinct rattle. That’s the dog chain knocking against its stopper as the ride falls. That noise is normal and safe. Yes, every sound means something, but it doesn’t always mean danger. It’s only if a ride makes a new or strange noise that it’s potentially dangerous. Also, I was mentioning the sound “not meaning anything” in the eyes of the ride operators. That’s not how I would view it. If I heard a new strange noise on any ride, I would stop it and have it checked out.
I found ot weird that they didn't. I've sat in queues at my local theme park when they've done test runs, and there were always water dummies. they have water dummies on hand as well. and you can actually buy pictures of the ride with water dummies if you feel that way inclined. (I know that because my mum did it, giggling her head off because they looked like gohsts and it was the spooky rude, and it was Halloween and past sunset. and she thought it was more interesting than the one of me and her, with me looking half asleep and her with her face obscured by hair).
the park even used the water dummies on some rides to enforce social distancing last year.
the idea of there not being water dummies on hand is just a foreign concept to me...
I operated the Shuttle Loop Type2 @ the former Six Flags AstroWorld. The boogie system was more robust on ours. When I saw the assembly (the year of the accident) I noted that it looked too "flimsy" for such a high stress ride. If YOU are NOT vigilant in your maintenance routine, this is how the ride will ultimately bite you in the a---s! We had a 7 car train (very heavy) While the 4 car train was lighter because of the new style boogie, going to the 3 car (double carry system) meant that train could still (with that weight) complete the course. Maintenance "clearly" were not trained to know that an empty test would not reveal the problem like a "load test" would. I was appalled when I found out of this gross negligence. I'm also sure Anton was saddened by this accident. I never got to meet his, but met his son @ IAAPA years ago. Two fine gentleman to be sure.
Ah, Greezed Lightnin'. That was a fun one. Especially the back seat.
New fatal accident in Sweden today :( 😢
My dad was there the day this happened, we were actually just talking about it so it’s kinda funny that this popped up in my suggested since I don’t watch these type of videos. He said he went to help but the employees told him not to bother
According to these comments, everyones parents were there that day lol
Rest in peace to those who lost their lives. They just wanted to have a fun day and make some good memories, instead it became a tragedy. My heart goes out to their families.
Send this video to all GP top list youtubers
WOOOAAAHHH THIS ROLLER COASTER KILLED 3 BILLION PEOPLE SO DANGEROUS DON'T RIDE THIS EVERRR!!!!!
What does gp stand for?
@@big.8534 General Public.
Basically everyone who is not a coaster enthusiast
In 2007 a ride derailed at an amusement park near my hometown. It was built in 96 with no problems. As it pulled into the stop station (which is a curve) the middle car began to jerk and derailed causing the ones behind it to flip. Luckily due to the lap bars no one fell out. Just some mild concussions, strains, and sprains for the riders in those back cars. They shut down the ride after that, fixed the ride, tested it again, and then opened it back up. Now it's been over 10 years with no major problems. It used to have minor ones that they would close it for but haven't had any of those in years. However, they still run empty cars every 30 minutes to make sure it's safe because of the problems it's had in the past
I live right beside West Edmonton Mall, the mall Galaxyland is located in. My dad was on the ride when the accident actually happened, he was a young adult and was in the front with his friends, so they were unharmed. But he’s told me a lot about the scary experience, especially seeing the carnage first hand. It’s scary to think about how I might not be here if he had been the back car rather than the front
I remember my Aunt telling me the story when she was about to go on the Mindbender that day. She was going to get on the train that was going to go after the one that crashed but she said she chickened out and was leaving the queue when she heard the large crash.
That's almost as crazy as the incident in Final Destination.
Surprised I've never heard of it until now!
That’s probably what the opening scene in 3 is based off of.
Very loosely, of course.
Wasn't final destination also filmed in Canada?
I want to thank you for this channel. I've been on an "amusement park disasters" Wikipedia/RUclips binge for awhile, and many of the stories and videos are frightening. Your videos are not only factual but help show that these accidents are rare and preventable.
Do you think you'll ever do a "What Really Happened" video on the Thunder River Rapids Ride at Dreamland in Australia? It's not a roller coaster but I do feel it deserves mention.
Bruh, you didn’t use my Mind Bender footage!
Great explanation, I didn’t know much about this incident, so thanks for the very informative video! :)
I'm from Edmonton and I remember all the talk on the school bus the next morning.
I wish I still had access to Edmonton's archives (I had it a few years ago for a uni project) I bet they would still have a copy of the accident report somewhere.
As a kid I always remember my parents never letting me on mindbender and even once going on a field trip to Galaxyland and the teacher not letting us ride it either. Kids always takes about how someone died on it once but I never go the whole story.
Thanks for the great video!
I love that coaster!
I grew up going to school a few blocks from west Ed.
I remember this incident too, I was 5 at the time, but it was major news. I never got to ride it previous to that incident, but I've rode it hundreds of times since.
I remember riding this many times, including going in the backwards car when I was on holiday in the area with my family over Christmas and New Year 96/97. Crazy, didn't even know about this incident. Still wouldn't have stopped me getting on it though.
...and now yet another Schwarzkopf design fatal accident...Jetline - Grona Lund
Who is here after WEM announced it’s permanently closed?
Ahh my home town. Edmonton also thanks for covering this story and tragic day. In my opinion this tragedy really changed the whole amusement industry. And roller coaster. So, Edmonton deserves at the credit.
RIP Mindbender. You may not stand anymore, but you’ll forever stand in our hearts😢
i literally love you for always putting your ads at the end of your videos
My dad was part of the inspection crew post accident.
He said majority of the nuts n bolts on the mindbender were the wrong grade (too weak). Also everything screw they tested we torqued way past recommended levels.
So when you have to much pressure on weak hardware it just stretched over time.
That was part of the problem that caused the accident.
Alberta local. My parents were there a few days before. My dad road it, my mom didn’t. My mom claims she heard it making a weird sound right at the section where the crash ends up happening, and my dad says that he felt the cart kind of jerk in that spot. He was also in the exact car that ended up derailing. One of my childhood friends moms was there the day of the crash. She was in line with a friend (or sister I can’t quite remember) and they would’ve been on at the time of the crash and I’m that car. But the friend/sister all of a sudden wasn’t feeling good right before they were going to board so the exited the line and didn’t go on. They then witnessed the crash.
The stupidity of assuming since a car makes no noise when it’s empty, it must be fine when full…I see logic was having a day off
I used to go to GalaxyLand often, and just looking at the MindBender scared the hell out of me. I nearly had a full blown panic attack looking at the pillars where it happened. I read that they had to paint over the pillars where the loop started and I remember staring at them with fear. The coaster was so damn loud, it sounded like a storm was happening inside. I was young, so learning about this incident rendered the whole trip completely unenjoyable. Luckily the wave pool is 100× better..
How does one ever get over a tragedy like this...God bless the families of all the victims.
September, 2019. The same roller coaster, the same accident. México city
And for the same reason ,lack of maintaining
One of the most tragic days Albertas history I was 6 when it happened still remember the reports.
Going to west Edmonton mall for my birthdays every year and seeing that coaster always gave me an uneasy feeling. I've still never been on it, and maybe never will..
Oh hey I've seen this video before
Still haven't been on the ride tho
Can you cover the accident of how little subscribers you have?
Me: binge watching Hamilton videos*
RUclips: okay but, what happened to the mindbender rollercoaster?
Me: oh shit what *did* happen?
Accidents is among the hardest topics to cover as coaster RUclipsrs, but you've handled it fair and effectively. A side-effect of this accident is Intamin ended their distributorship deal with Schwarzkopf. Intamin also relocated their HQ to Liechtenstein - it is alleged in light of possible lawsuits.
I did not know that, thanks for the interesting info! This accident sure changed the industry!
I just went to Galaxyland a couple of weeks ago. This coaster was closed, and after seeing this video I'm somewhat glad it was.
Wow never heard of this accident at all before today. It was on my recommended
All rollercoaster deaths are caused by human negligence and laziness
It’s scary that my father was in line ready to get on when the carriage crashed. He saw the entire thing
I like that you recreated the accident in 3d, it helps to explain the accident.
My dad was on the ride the week before the accident, so it's weird to think about what could've happened. As a resident of Edmonton, this accident is all people talk about when you mention Galaxyland. I, unfortunately, am too scared to ride the mindbender, but I did get stuck on a different ride at Galaxyland a few years back.
I've been to Canada's Wonderland, Cedar Point and Darien Lake and Mindbender in WEM still ranks near the top for experience. The shape of the loops increase the g force.
You said June 4th 1986... based on your title I expect you know it was the 14th. Thank you for the credit at the end of the video.
my bad, and no problem, I used your site as part of my research!
@@CoasterCollege ...and my mindbender video too, based on that rattling sound! XD Well done here, great stuff.
i want to hear about the 2019 accident you mentioned at the end, could you one day make a video on that?
La Feria, in Mexico City, was a the first theme park in Latin America but the park was mostly owned by the government, but it being a corrupt one they just turned a blind eye towards safety (I always prefered going to Six Flags, all the rides on the park felt cheap and unsafe) on september 28th the last car of the Chimera, the same model as this one, snapped off the rails slamming into a wall, two of the four passangers died on impact, another one had craneal fractures and the last one walked off with cuts and bruises, unfortunately there isnt much more info since it is a park ran basically by the government so censoring is found by the dozen, the accident also revealed that another accident took the life of a teen some years back which the park covered up, anyway, the government basically said it was poor maintenance combined with the record that this model has (that record being the accident on this video) and shut down the park, sad to see that corruption took many lifes and also a big historical jewel from us, now the park is just sitting there abandoned, getting more and more covered in grafity, there was supposed to be auction for the park but it was gonna take place this month so that´s not happening.
His most recent video is on it now too:))
FroZen thank you !! :))
@@kaylarose2383 no probs :)
@@MultiPaco06 I heard different. The government used to own the park and then sold it to a private company. The negotiation of the sale stipulated that they keep ticket prices low. The private company was at fault for not maintaining the rides likely because they were more concerned with generating profits.
Edmonton resident here, always have loved riding the Mindbender, last time I was at galaxyland I rode the thing 20 times in a row XD Love the history this ride has
It's awesome to see you take your job so seriously that you not only research this stuff but make presentations for others. You rule.
This accident was covered in the September, 1987 issue of Popular Mechanics "Killer Coasters", I purchased the magazine at WEM shortly after riding the Mindbender. Still have it. I have been on the Mindbender at least annually for more than 30 years. Awesome rollercoaster. Sometimes they have the rear car on the blue train facing backwards, which is quite an experience (although hard on your neck when you don't see a sharp turn coming up).
This takes ejector airtime to a whole new level
I remember when I was a kid, when me and my friends was at galaxy land for a party, one of my friends mentioning the accident. We were looking at the empty line ride at the time, and we scurried back up, because we were terrified of the ride, mostly because we were afraid of every big coaster!
Wait wait now I need to know about the 2019 accident!!!
I was hear the next year and they were running the coasters constantly with no riders to test it. It was eerie.
"Huh, weird lol"
-Maintenance Staff
Would you ever do a video on the 2016 Verrückt water slide incident at the Schlitterbahn park in Kansas City? It's an excellent example of egregious negligence in an amusement park, and the indictment giving a detailed report of what happened is available online.
Maintenance: call me when someone dies
I am currently doing a project on Canadian disasters for geography class and this video was rather helpful, thanks!
The thought NEVER occurred to maintenance that the sounds heard had something to do with the weight of the car plus people?? How...wha, what?
Time pressure and combine that with the fact that most maintenance calls are false alarms.
@@wesleyvink7627 Do they then usually assume the ride operators are just hearing fake noises and keep it moving? The weight of the passengers never come to mind? It was the first thing I shouted not even knowing what was wrong, because...you know...physics.
@@CleoPhoenixRT this was unprecedented at the time so they thought it'll be fine." I don't hear anything so it must have been something else. Its probably not important". I'm not defending it they fucked up big time. But this was probably the reason it happened
And also like i said time constraints every moment a coaster is not moving is money lost and more annoyed customer's
@@wesleyvink7627 yikesss, they sure lost money that day