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Callers deluge police with horror stories
Drop Zone riders tell tales of employee negligence; park denies computer warning related to accident
By Kelly Wilkinson
Although they say they're still baffled by Sunday's fatal accident at Paramount's Great America Theme Park, police are looking into the possibility that employee negligence or mechanical failure caused 12-year-old Joshua Smurphat to fall to his death while riding the Drop Zone.
Sergeant Anton Morec of the Santa Clara Police Department said that in the wake of the accident, police are fielding an influx of calls from park-goers recalling frightening experiences.
"We're getting some calls from people who generically think the employees are not diligent," he said. "People are saying that some of the workers might fall into the 'lax' category."
Morec pointed out that those opinions are, so far, subjective.
Tim Chanaud of Great America said the park is not commenting on those reports until its investigation is completed.
Police said they are investigating the training of the park's workers and maintenance records to determine the cause of the accident.
"There is no smoking gun right now," Morec said. He added that the case is a mystery, because park officials are reporting that the harness which straps riders to their seats was still locked after the boy somehow fell out.
"That's what we're still trying to figure out--how this could have happened if he was locked in," Morec said. "I'm not suggesting that wasn't the case, but we're looking into it."
He said another car in the ride had been discontinued from carrying any passengers when a computerized "error" message flashed on the ride's control board. But Chanaud stressed that there was "absolutely no possibility that [Smurphat]'s car could have been affected."
"This was completely separate and had absolutely nothing to do with [the accident]," he said.
Nevertheless, Morec said, between 20 and 30 visitors have called Santa Clara police recalling experiences that left them rattled.
Morec said the police are talking to eyewitnesses, employees, and other park visitors who rode the Drop Zone close to the time of the accident, several of whom have recounted near-misses on previous rides on the Drop Zone.
The police retained an independent expert to examine the ride yesterday and Great America has hired a Menlo Park-based accident-analysis company to generate a computerized account of the incident.
Morec expects the police expert to release some of his findings later this week. They also plan to release a press release with some of the findings and information from the coroner's report later this week.
Morec pointed out that he did not believe there is a sensor on the Drop Zone to detect when a seat's harness opens mid-ride. Chanaud confirmed that the ride is not equipped with such a safety device.
Smurphat, who was physically and mentally disabled, may not have been able to tell anyone if his harness was not working because of his disabilities.
According to Chanaud, Smurphat was one of the last passengers allowed on the ride before it was to be shut off for a safety check at around 3:20 p.m.
The Drop Zone is a free-fall ride where passengers are harnessed into seats facing outward and raised to the top of a 224-foot high tower. From the tower's peak, cars are then released for a 129-foot free-fall before brakes are activated by a magnetic field.
According to park officials and the police reports, Smurphat was locked into his seat and his car was in its descent when he somehow fell out of the ride and hit the ground. He was pronounced dead at 3:36 p.m., 11 minutes after the first report of the accident, and police said he was most likely killed upon impact.
The ride's security features include a molded plastic seat with a saddle horn to prevent slippage, and a U-shaped security bar that dips from passengers' shoulders to stomach.
"Between the plastic saddle horn to keep you from sliding and the security bar, we just don't know how [Smurphat] could have gotten out of this ride," Morec said. "It's very difficult, but obviously it happened."
In an eerie coincidence, the Senate Appropriations Committee passed a bill that would require annual state maintenance and mechanical inspections of all amusement parks. California has the highest number of amusement parks and the highest number of accidents in the country, but the state does not have the power to investigate the accidents or require state inspections.
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Sunnyvale, California Since 1994
