Note: During the pandemic, exposure to amusement rides has been greatly decreased by closures and facility capacity reduction. For this reason, quarterly recaps for Q2, Q3 and Q4 have not been posted.
Reports posted in 2020 covered 66 unique events in 2020 or previous years, as tabulated below. Reports describing events of earlier years typically arise when a news report covers emerging litigation. These cases have been recapped in the 2020 monthly posts.
| Occurred 2015 | Occurred 2017 | Occurred 2018 | Occurred 2019 | Occurred 2020 | UNS year | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2 | 2 | 5 | 8 | 48 | 1 |
Cases x Region
Similar numbers of reports originated in North America, Latin America and Europe, Middle East and Africa regions; fewer reports were covered from Asia-based operations.
Cases x Operation Type
Operation type continues to frequently be unclear in media coverage. Reporters routinely call carnivals “amusement parks”. Waterparks are often confused with public recreational swimming facilities, and one excluded case reported on a home spa as though it was a “waterpark”. As such, precision of the breakdowns should not be overstated.
This breakdown includes 65 events as one report could not even support reasonable speculation as to operation type. Nearly half of the stories reported occurrences at fixed-site operations.
Event type x Region
Names of event types have been refined to group, when sorted alphabetically, into operation-related, patron-related, ride-related. Because of the distinct nature of drownings and near-drownings, submersion is listed separately. Because of the journalistic popularity of otherwise uneventful interrupted ride cycles resulting in delay and restart or alternate unload (evacuation), these are no longer tabulated, and all cases described as “malfunction” were consequential malfunctions of the mechanical or structural integrity of the ride.
Reports on 61 cases described an event type and region; five cases could be located but were unclear about the event type.
Event type x Operation type
Reports on 61 cases described event type and operation type; four described the operation type but not the event type. One case reported neither.
Ride type x Region
Names of ride types have been refined, to group mechanical rides according to whether they are tracked/guided vs. revolving/oscillating and elevated vs. horizontal/flat. This will group river rapids with roller coaster, and swing towers with vertical revolving rides, to reflect the energy of speed and elevation. Some horizontally revolving rides are also fast and expose the rider to significant kinetic energy, but not potential energy due to elevation.
Patron directed rides include inflatable bounces, trampolines, and slides as well as vehicle-based devices such as go karts and bumper cars. Adventure rides include ziplines and bungee attractions at this time. Due to the number of reports of each, waterpark pool and waterslide occurrences are reported separately.
Reports about 65 events had data on both ride type and region.
Event type x Ride type
Event type for 30 cases involving mechanical rides are reported below.
The sole Adventure ride report involved misoperation. While half of all waterpark pool cases were submersions (drowning or near-drowning), other event types also occurred. Despite the perception that patron behaviour characterizes most injury events, particularly patron-directed ride types, there were no patron self-extractions and just two action failures in this ride type.
Ride type x Operation type
Reports about 65 events had data on both ride type and operation type.
Severity
Severity was mentioned or could be speculated from description in 65 reports; one was unspecified. One or more patrons sustained fatal injury in 23 reports.
As has been previously noted, media coverage takes greater interest in fatal cases. Operators and regulators indicate that fatal injury comprises a small fraction of cases relative to no-injury, onsite comfort, and first aid cases. However, access to these records is limited to internal analysis. Other than fatal injury, cases involving hospitalization or medical care attracted coverage.
Regional differences in media coverage are also seen in relation to severity. North American and European operations received more coverage of low severity consequences.
Fatal injury comprised more than half of waterpark injury coverage. No-injury cases were reported only about fixed-site operations.
This summary of amusement ride accident coverage in the 2020 media is inherently limited by media access to information about occurrences. Reporters may hear of accidents in a variety of ways, including police scanners when first responders are called or posts on social media that may be spectacular in appearance but minimally harmful. As such, the analysis of media coverage cannot be read as the pattern or breakdown of the accidents that occur, or an indication of the underlying risks. While each media-reported event very likely did occur, the same patterns are unlikely to be seen in non-media-reported events because it is these characteristics that make up the pattern that also influence the perceived newsworthiness of an event as a potential media story. Even considering that additional injuries were likely experienced and not covered in the media, injuries are sustained in a very small fraction of ride exposures.