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Kansas City police said a 10-year-old boy who was killed at a water park Sunday died as the result of a fatal neck injury. The park is scheduled to re-open on Wednesday. (Aug. 9) AP
epa05464390 A handout picture obtained from Schlitterbahn Waterparks And Resorts on 08 August 2016 shows people riding the so-called Verrueckt water slide at the Schlitterbahn Kansas City Waterpark in Kansas City, Kansas, USA, 09 July 2014. According to news reports on 08 August 2016, a boy has been killed on the 51.2 meter high water slide, allegedly the tallest in the world, at the amusement park in Kansas City. The exact cause of death was not immediately known. EPA/SCHLITTERBAHN WATERPARKS AND RESORTS / HANDOUT MANDATORY CREDIT: SCHLITTERBAHN WATERPARKS AND RESORTS. HANDOUT EDITORIAL USE ONLY/NO SALES(Photo: SCHLITTERBAHN WATERPARKS AND RESORTS / HANDOUT, EPA)
Amusement park experts say that a<span style="color: Red;">*</span>fatal injury that killed a 10-year-old boy at a giant Kansas water slide is a chilling example of an all-too-familiar reality: namely, that fun doesn't always mean safe.
Emergency responders called to the Schlitterbahn Waterpark on Sunday found Caleb Schwab's body in a pool at the end of the "Verruckt," billed as<span style="color: Red;">*</span>the world's tallest water slide, Kansas City Police Chief Terry Zeigler said. Two women in his raft suffered minor facial injuries and were treated at a local hospital. "Verruckt" means insane in German.
On Monday, three girls were injured after falling out of a Ferris wheel at a county fair in Greeneville, Tenn.
Jun Zhuang, a professor of industrial and systems engineering at the University of Buffalo, told USA TODAY that it is virtually impossible to test water<span style="color: Red;">*</span>slides for all possible combinations of weather and wind conditions.
"The newly designed tallest, fastest, steepest water slides . . . attain higher and higher speeds and become more and more dangerous," Zhuang said.
A structure can be designed to safely handle anticipated loads, but at the beginning of any design, one has to make assumptions - such as how securely people are fastened in and the weight of occupants, he said. But in the end a rider is a "lab mouse" because conditions vary so widely.
Ken Martin, an amusement park safety consultant, has called for more stringent, uniform federal regulations.
"To have fun, you don't need to necessarily be the tallest or the fastest," he said. Martin called riders "the last inspectors" for any ride and warned park goers to "take your common sense with you."
Caleb, the boy who died, is the son of state Rep. Scott Schwab and Michele Schwab of Olathe. The couple brought their four sons to the park that day, when families of elected officials were allowed in free of charge. He suffered a neck injury after barreling down the 168-foot slide.
A 2013 study by the Nationwide Children’s Hospital, a pediatric health care and research center<span style="color: Red;">*</span>found that, from 1990 to 2010, 92,885 children under 18 were treated in U.S. emergency rooms for amusement ride-related injuries – or an average of<span style="color: Red;">*</span>4,423 per year. More than 70% of those injuries were in the summer months of May through September, for an average of 20 injuries<span style="color: Red;">*</span>per day.
U.S. fixed-site amusement and theme parks<span style="color: Red;">*</span>– permanent sites like Disney and Six Flags<span style="color: Red;">*</span>parks – attract about 335 million visitors a year and water parks draw about 85 million visitors a year,<span style="color: Red;">*</span>according to the International Association of Amusement Parks and Attractions, or IAAPA.
Though the rides in those parks are generally safe, enough accidents occur each year that a more comprehensive oversight system should be put in place, said Gary Smith, director of the Center for Injury Research and Policy at<span style="color: Red;">*</span>Nationwide Children’s Hospital, who authored the 2013 study.
“Anyone would be concerned by, summer after summer, some of the catastrophic injuries that are occurring,” he said. “Given the volume of users, we need a better coordinated effort.”
The study, one of the few such comprehensive looks at amusement-ride injuries, found that head and neck injuries were the most common (28%), followed by arms (24%), face (18%) and legs (17%). Soft-tissue injuries were also the most common (29%), followed by strains and sprains (21%) cuts (20%) and broken bones (10%).
The report also pointed out deficiencies in how the various parks are regulated. The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission is responsible for overseeing and investigating injuries at temporary parks, such as traveling carnivals and county fairs, though they don’t conduct inspections, said Patty Davis, a commission spokeswoman. The commission also sets safety standards for the parks, but implementing those standards are voluntary, not mandatory. Fixed-site facilities are overseen by state and local agencies.
The commission<span style="color: Red;">*</span>used to oversee all amusement parks, but in the early 1980s, U.S. Congress removed<span style="color: Red;">*</span>fixed-site parks from their realm of responsibility, Davis said. Today, the agency, underfunded and undermanned,<span style="color: Red;">*</span>struggles to keep<span style="color: Red;">*</span>up with the scores of carnivals, fairs and other temporary amusement parks across the USA, she said.
“We’re a small agency and it’s difficult to oversee every fair that sets up in a short period of time,” she said.
Each year, the IAAPA commissions its own survey of amusement ride-related injuries, a voluntary effort of its fixed-site parks. The most recent one, the<span style="color: Red;">*</span>2014 report, showed a decrease in ride-related injuries from 2,044 in 2003 to 1,150 in 2014. The attendance-based injury rate also fell from 7 per million attendees in 2003 to 3.8 per million attendees in 2014, according to the study.
The majority of the 2014 injuries occurred in family and adult rides (58%), followed by roller coasters (33%) and children’s rides (8%).
U.S. fixed-site amusement park rides are subject to one or more layers of independent examination, including state and local government, insurance companies, and private safety firms, said David Mandt, an IAAPA spokesman.
"We have no reason to believe a federal program would improve on the already outstanding safety record of the industry," he said.
Smith agreed that amusement park rides are generally safe, statistically speaking. But a better oversight system, starting with a national data-gathering effort, could help prevent further injuries, he said.
“This is a relatively safe activity,” Smith said. “What we can’t say with any certainty is how many injuries are occurring to what groups.”
He added: “I assure you we could do better, but we need the data to do it.”
Follow Rick Jervis on Twitter: @MrRJervis
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