What qualifies those people to know whether or not the restraint locking does or does not "sound right"? Think for a moment the number of times you've heard wildly incorrect information from normal/non-enthusiasts standing in line. Take what those people said in this scenario with an enormous serving of salt.
People are pointing out the relative safety because context matters, and because people are terrible at analyzing risk in varying contexts. This is obviously an unimaginably terrible tragedy, to put it mildly. But at least some of the folks who are pointing out relative safety/risk aren't doing so to minimize the situation. They are doing so to counter the predictable wave of folks arguing in ALL CAPS that we must prevent all bad outcomes all the time at all cost. Emotional responses such as those, while totally understandable, should not be guiding ride engineering decisions.
You know what else would prevent roller coaster deaths? No roller coasters. Point being, there is no way to eliminate risk entirely. The only thing that can be done is to reduce risk to an acceptable amount.
Yes, automobile seatbelts save lives, but they do not eliminate automobile deaths completely, so why stop there? Why not require drivers to wear helmets and full race gear? Why do we allow vehicles at all? If we want to eliminate risk associated with driving, simply adding seatbelts and airbags (etc.) won't cut it, we need to ban driving outright. Obviously that's not going to happen, because we are willing to accept a certain amount of risk for the convenience of personal automobiles.
Roller coasters are no different. These B&M rides have probably provided a billion+ rides over the years without a rider dying, meaning the odds of dying are astronomically tiny. Adding a seatbelt might reduce the odds, but mathematically would only take them from imperceptibly minuscule to imperceptibly minuscule.
Additional safety measures have tradeoffs. Just like with automobile seatbelts, adding a seatbelt won't eliminate risk entirely, so why stop there? Why not limit their height, speed, and layouts so that an ejected rider would land safely in a foam pit? Why not have lapbars, OTSRs, and five seatbelts just in case the first four fail?
The point being, don't assume those of us pointing out the uncomfortable statistical reality are callous "thoosies" who simply don't like long lines or whatever. Some of us can simultaneously mourn this horrific tragedy while not being blinded by our emotional response.
To be clear, I am not arguing dogmatically against seat belts on coasters, just on the assumption that there's an engineering/safety case to add them.
By
DispatchMaster ·
