| When I was a ride op years ago at Frontier City, we were told that we had the right to delay or suspend operations at any time for any justifiable reason like unusual sound or mechanical oddities; it was all up to us to use our judgment.
However for weather issues, operation suspension was administered by management -- we either got a phone call from operations base or a supervisor/manager would come to our ride personally and tell us to suspend operations. If lightning was sighted from anywhere in the park, all rides over 50 feet high and water rides were closed and evacuated.
The controls of a ride are surprisingly simple. There are only a few controls we really needed to worry about:
-- Ride launch/dispatch. In the park I was at, each major ride had two different control panels, each with one of those buttons -- one for the (un)loader and the other for dispatch. In order for the cars/trains to be launched or dispatched, both operators needed to simultaneously push their respective buttons to send them on their way. This is where hand signals (most frequently the thumbs up) is crucial.
-- Push-button spiels that sounded a pre-recorded safety speech through the speakers. Only the dispatcher had that control.
-- Restraints lock/unlock. Again only the dispatcher had control over that.
-- Rider counter. The loader had this control and would repeatedly press a counter button according to how many riders he had loaded onboard.
Another thing I got to control was the queue line. We were also responsible for rerouting the line along additional queues when lines were overflowed. And both operators were responsible for checking all restraints (lap bar and belts) before sending the car or train.
When an E-Stop was activated, it was the operators responsibility to go to the stalled train using sidesteps along the track to be with the riders stuck onboard until further notice by management or a mechanic.
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Straying just a tad away from the topic: Basically mechanics had a lot of the powers management had (and this might be the case for a lot of parks) in deciding to halt operations of a particular ride due to technical problems and instructing ride operator to follow certain directions, and I have seen quite a few cases where a mechanic has overruled a decision or direction given by management. I have also seen mechanics exercise their power to take an operator off a ride or ban them from the ride due to his or her lack of safety awareness or negligence, but only management had the power to revoke his or her certification after further review.
So for any of you current ride operators that aren't aware already, ride mechanics can act just like management, even though they're not technically your "boss," and you need to listen to them and follow their instructions; failure to comply with their directions can cost you your certification and potentially your job.
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Last edited by Jimmy B; 09-10-2008 at 11:20 PM..
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