Skyhawk Cable Snap - July 26, 2014

I never even gave a second thought to those cables failing. But can someone answer the question as to why cables were used instead of just using metal supports matching the ones making up the arms of the ride?

Just a design question, not trying to be a "Monday morning Quarterback"!

Walt said:

JUnderhill said:
A fan forum is definitely the best place to research what type of problems an amusement ride has had in the past. We are all obviously experts, and mechanical engineers that can explain the exact circumstances of past ride troubles.

Despite being "just" a fan website, you'd be surprised at the experience and knowledge we have here, including people who work in the industry and those who can confidently speak to ATSM standard.

My apologies to the handful of people here who are experts in the industry, and also have expertise in Skyhawk and the situations that have occurred on the past on that ride.

The damaged fence is definitely in line with the cable that broke, side facing the midway and the far left cable. There is also a small chunk of concrete damaged on the edge of the pad under the ride, closest to the fence. Needless to say the ride is not operating and no park employees or barricades are around it.

Although it sounds like the e-brake was the right decision in this case to avoid more injury, I hope they find a better way to deal with unexpected events on this type of ride. I hate to wonder, but what would have happened if someone did have a life threatening injury and the ride was just swinging for minutes until it stopped. That doesn't seem like a very efficient way to deal with an accident, as a few minutes are a very long time if someone is critically injured.

That's what I'm wondering. If someone is dying, letting the ride free swing for 10 minutes would be too long.

JW Addington said:
I never even gave a second thought to those cables failing. But can someone answer the question as to why cables were used instead of just using metal supports matching the ones making up the arms of the ride?

Just a design question, not trying to be a "Monday morning Quarterback"!

You have an excellent point JW! Especially after Kentucky Kingdom's unfortunate accident. Why aren't these cables hidden? Just like they now have anti-roll backs and chain guards. Amusement parks should start taking note and covering these cables so if they do snap, no guest will be hit with a whipping cable or lose a body part :(

You realize that if an enclosed cable snapped (or broke loose) with enough force, it could break right through its enclosure, causing even more hazardous shrapnel to be sent flying through the air, right? It's not a simple matter of, "Oh, let's put a box over it and our problems will go away." Didn't Disaster Transport teach us that lesson? ;)

I really hope that Skyhawk is fixed soon. And maybe the parks best option for the ride (nit this offseason, some future one) is to completely rebuild the ride or at least one very similar with existing parts that are still being manufactured and maybe of some higher quality. I have always loved the ride experience and being able to describe it to people as their backyard swing set on steroids. ;)

Wait, just thought of this. If the drive cable did not snap like last time why did the ride take 10 minutes to stop. Wouldn't they be able to stop the ride with the E-stop? Then unlike last time riders would not be stranded for a long time. I could maybe have misread and this is what happened but better ask anyway.

Gatekeeper2013 said:
I really hope that Skyhawk is fixed soon. And maybe the parks best option for the ride (nit this offseason, some future one) is to completely rebuild the ride or at least one very similar with existing parts that are still being manufactured and maybe of some higher quality. I have always loved the ride experience and being able to describe it to people as their backyard swing set on steroids. ;)

Wait, just thought of this. If the drive cable did not snap like last time why did the ride take 10 minutes to stop. Wouldn't they be able to stop the ride with the E-stop? Then unlike last time riders would not be stranded for a long time. I could maybe have misread and this is what happened but better ask anyway.

Im not familiar with how the ride controls are for sky hawk, but I have operated smaller swing rides. Even with an e-stop, some of them take some time to finish moving and move back into their starting positions.

Being around 10pm and as dark as it probably was, they might not of known what was wrong immediately (in regards to which cable had snapped, if they even knew what snapped). Stopping the ride is one of the top priorities to prevent further injury and damage.

Dave explained on pg3 of this thread why the ride continued to swing even after employees recognized there was a problem.

RideMan said:

It's also worth noting that "emergency stop" often does not mean what you might expect it to mean. You would expect it to mean, "Make it stop, RFN!". In fact, because the requirements for emergency stop functions prior to June of 2014* were rooted in electrical requirements, the real meaning of "emergency stop" is "Kill the power and dump the stored energy, RFN!". That means kill the power and vent the air system, removing all energy from the ride actuating means. That means a ride like Skyhawk, which relies on a powered stop, would go into free swing.

E-stop doesn't apply breaks to the ride, it cuts power. I believe Ocean Motion and Maxair also go into free swings if the emergency button is pressed.

The ride ops are trained to press the e-stop button if something goes wrong, I think the freewheeling was actually good to avoid over stressing the ride after the tension cable broke. To those who think this wasn't handled well, you're wrong. As Dave explained, the e-stop button is supposed to work like it did and the ride operator did exactly what they should have.

I'm not sure if anyone heard this but I heard the cable didn't snap but that the bolt holding it gave way. Not sure about tho

That would make sense, the bolt probably developed a crack and broke. If that is the case, what happened is well understood and the ride should not be down for to long.

That is until the lawsuits start. :/

I don't think there would be any lawsuits, the injuries didn't sound too bad. I'm sure the park compensated the injured. Usually they would do that to keep the customers happy and prevent lawsuits.

I was being partially sarcastic. Let's just not forget that this IS 'Murica after all. ;)

Oh the lawsuits will be in the works come Monday morning, and not just from the injured parties either.

Hey guys, I just want to reiterate that the ride crew did the right thing by pressing E-Stop. It's what they're trained to do, and given that it was dark they probably didn't see right away which cable it was. They had to make a knee-jerk reaction, and at Cedar Point that's an E-Stop.

Please go easy on them. It was a very, very, stressful and scary situation.

Im a former CF ride operator, and that is what we were trained to do in the event something goes really wrong.
For some rides, an Estop will stop the ride outside of a position that is unsafe to unload passengers, so we were told use our best judgement in regards to an estop (hearing a weird or strange noise versus someone ran into the ride area, lap bar disengaged, smoke/fire, ect)

After seeing a couple news stories, it sounds like most of the damage on the ground was caused by the cable being dragged around while the ride was slowing down. As has been stated, the cable that broke loose was not under a high amount of tension, so most of the danger seems related to the size and unpredictability of it bouncing around.

If the cable was caught in the fence, I can see how a couple swings back and forth, even at low speeds would easily mangle it to pieces.