Schlitterbahn’s Tragic Slide • Hacker News Board

Re: Schlitterbahn’s Tragic Slide

#111

Post by MrBuddyCasino » Sun, Jul 22, 2018, 9:11 AM UTC

watwut wrote: post #23

MrBuddyCasino wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a steep slide in a german water park that women aren’t allowed to ride. The reason is that if ridden with legs spread, water can forcefully enter the vagina and cause injuries. So that’s a real possibility.

Wouldn't that hurt men even more? If they spread legs there are privates and men tend to be sensitive when those are hit.

Not sure why, maybe males have a protective reflex? For a while women could ride, with warning signs that legs must be crossed at all times. Incidents still happened, so they had to go male only.

Re: Schlitterbahn’s Tragic Slide

#112

Post by dahauns » Sun, Jul 22, 2018, 4:23 PM UTC

techsupporter wrote: post #4

Maybe as a way to help compartmentalism from what the article is describing, I keep wondering: why do “long form” stories all seem to follow the same script? - Introduction to the subject - Introduction to the “characters” - “Dramatic thing began to happen, with seemingly innocuous steps taken towards the unforeseen conclusion, but then, as the thing begins to unfo—“ - “Back in 1823, when the ancestor of the grandfat…

>- Introduction to the subject

...containing detailed descriptions of one or more of the following:

* The weather at the chosen time of introduction

* One or more anatomical features and/or pieces of attire of the subject

* A mode of transport/vehicle used by the protagonist

* Some arbitrary item with personal value to the protagonist

And so on.

Like straight from a "My first novel" writing course. It's grating.

Re: Schlitterbahn’s Tragic Slide

#113

Post by bb88 » Mon, Jul 23, 2018, 12:14 AM UTC

TheSpiceIsLife wrote: post #106

bb88 wrote: post #85

FTA: What’s more, according to court documents, the investigators learned that on July 3, 2014, one week before the ride’s grand opening, an engineering firm hired by Jeff and Schooley to perform accelerometer tests on Verrückt’s rafts had issued a report suggesting that if the combined weight of the three passengers in a raft was between 400 and 550 pounds—the weight Jeff and Schooley had agreed was appropriate—ther…

From the indictment: 39. HENRY remarked, "[Verrückt] could hurt me, it could kill me, it is a seriously dangerous piece of equipment today because there are things that we don't know about. Every day we learn more. * I've seen what this one has done to the crash dummies and to the boats we sent down it. Ever since the prototype. And we had boats flying in the prototype too. * It's complex, it's fast, it's mean. If we…

Thanks for that. That's as bad as testimony one can get.

Re: Schlitterbahn’s Tragic Slide

#114

Post by Gibbon1 » Mon, Jul 23, 2018, 6:37 AM UTC

rossdavidh wrote: post #56

I think this article makes too much of the fact that they were not engineers (I say this as a person with two engineering degrees), and too little of the fact that this was by far not the first indication of problems. I can't find the HN link now, but the official government report was pretty damning. There were numerous incidents that lead to injuries, numerous reports that rafts had gone airborne when they shouldn'…

I believe one of the reason we have professional engineering licenses which require years of working under a PE is because an engineering degree is simply not enough to weed out the loons and incompetents.

I worked for 10 years for a industrial controls company and I have a wildly more conservative attitude towards safety than most of the engineers, especially CS people I know. Far as I can tell this doesn't correlate to a having an accredited degree at all.

Re: Schlitterbahn’s Tragic Slide

#115

Post by falsedan » Mon, Jul 23, 2018, 7:17 PM UTC

kevinSuttle wrote: post #103

falsedan wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

insert throwaway comment about the lack of ethics education in STEM goes here

Is this supposed to mean something?

further throwaway comment about lack of reading comprehension and basic empathy education in STEM goes here