17-year-old worker shuts down entire ride at the theme park where they work after their boss scapegoats the team for his own mistake: 'I shut down the ride'

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Brad Dickson • Managing Editor
Sep 15, 2025 12:00 PM EDT

Problems start small, seemingly insignificant. But if ignored, they snowball into something much, much bigger. Ignore an injury or health issue, and it may spiral into something that is much more difficult and time-consuming to solve—and much more dangerous. Ignore a minor issue at work, and it might escalate into a critical issue that brings productivity to a standstill. Although what happens more often here is that a worker has appropriately escalated a problem, and somewhere up the chain, it is brushed aside, swept under, or deemed to be of low priority.

It's for this reason that effective managers know how to spot and tackle a problem while it is still small. Effective problem-solving is counterintuitive in this way. Going out of your way to look into and fix issues that aren't in your face and urgent seems like more work at the outset, but it's saving you a load of work and time in the long run.

Ignoring problems, of course, has different applications and risks depending on the nature of your work. You might fail to deliver on the timeline of a project, or you might run into a safety procedure that halts production that has been designed to avoid something worse. And when operating any sort of large machinery with dangerous moving parts, safety procedures are paramount, and with that comes proper communication and awareness.

 

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  • It's a bit silly when you think about it, really, all an amusement park ride is a large machine with dangerous moving parts that could cause serious injury. Yet when covered with cute characters and plaster, in exotic guises, we're perfectly content with submitting our well-being to them. And yet, they're often operated by teens who are working their first summer gig, who are likely inexperienced and haven't yet learned the full responsibility of paying attention and doing a job properly.

    This 17-year-old worker worked for a theme park, and despite their youth, they were known for their commitment to responsibility. It was their boss who was a bit laissez-faire when it came to operating procedures.

    Their team radios were essential to the safe operation of the rides, but their boss or "lead" had a habit of ignoring the need for fresh batteries to keep things running smoothly. This led to several incidents where a worker was locked in a dangerous area while the ride was operating, the blowback of which was framed onto the 17-year-old and his team members.

    Of course, things continued to go south, with a new rule forbidding the ride to be operated if a single radio battery ran out. Despite this, continued issues with radio batteries now saw repeated shutdowns of the ride. The real issue persisted: Their lead "M" continued to not pay proper attention to the procedures and safety, failing repeatedly to fix the simple issue of getting fresh radio batteries before they became a major problem.

  • 01

    "If a single radio's battery dies, shut it all down"

    This happened over 5 years ago, and it still ticks me off whenever I think about it. Also sorry about how long this is lol: I was 17 working at a big theme park, and had been working there for the better part of the year. I had quickly picked things up, and was usually regarded as the responsible one on the team when it was just a bunch of us teens working a ride. We had a college student intern lead who was... not good at leading, or training new hires... We'll call him M.
    via bingbong_Iamwrong
  • 02
    A theme park ride operates at night brightly lit against the dark sky
    via Nikitha Suresh

    The image is representative only and does not depict the actual subjects of the story.

  • 03
    At my main ride, it required 3 people minimum to operate; One person in the control booth, one at the entrance gate, and one at the exit. However, we could have 4 or 5 if we were incredibly busy to help deal with the line. The people in the booth and at the entrance could not see the person at the exit directly, so we used radios. The control booth also had a camera on the exit gate. From day 1 on the job, we were taught hand signals in case the radio dies or for quick communication, these signa
    via bingbong_Iamwrong
  • 04
    That summer, 3 freshly certified kids (we had to take tests to prove we paid attention to training) started the ride with someone locked inside the fence, aka: not in a seat. Twice it was another employee, once it was a guest (which was a HUGE deal). The thing with those incidents was that those in the control booth didn't notice their mistake until the others SCREAMED at them to hit the E-stop. Those new hires were either retrained or moved to a simpler ride.
    via bingbong_Iamwrong
  • 05
    Well, one incredibly busy day, there were 5 of us running things. Me, M, and 3 others. M had been called over to another ride, which normally wasn't an issue. About an hour later, someone was scheduled to go home, and M hadn't come back yet. I called the other ride and asked them to send him back. We could've run things with 3 of us, but it was super busy and we really needed a 4th. A few minutes later, someone (not our lead) was sent over to take over. Weird, but no big deal.
    via bingbong_Iamwrong
  • 06
    Another hour or so went by, someone else needed to go home, I called again asking for M. Also, all the radios' batteries were de d/d ng. Things had slowed down, so I, being the spare 4th person, took the radios to the office to get fresh batteries. This took less than 10 minutes, and in that time, the guys had switched to hand signals as we were trained. When I came back, our lead had once again sent over someone else to take his spot. At this point I realized that M was probably just shooting t
    via bingbong_Iamwrong
  • 07
    Now the guy that got sent over to us was normally at a rollercoaster and hadn't been at this ride in over a month, so I gave him a quick review and he took controls. I turned around for maybe 30 seconds when I hear yelling. I turn around, and the ride was stopped maybe 3 ft off the ground with our entrance guy locked in the fence. The guy at controls saw what he did and hit the E-stop, something that the other screwups that summer did not think to do.
    via bingbong_Iamwrong
  • 08
    We had to call upper management, and wouldn't ya know? M came running over! This time the highest of the higher ups came over as well. They pulled each of us aside and interrogated us (which was odd) then walked away and talked for like half an hour. They then FIRED the guy at controls on the spot, and came up with BS reasons to get the rest of us removed from running rides. They
    via bingbong_Iamwrong
  • 09
    absolutely were only doing that to make an example of us. I tried to rip into M for shirking his duties, but as an anxiety ridden kid it didn't hit very hard. I was mainly p ed off that they fired the poor guy who never should have been there in the first place.
    via bingbong_Iamwrong
  • 10
    Remember I took the already de d radios earlier? They tried to say I had 'removed communication devices from the ride area' which prevented them from letting controls know they were outside the gate. They were basically trying to pin the whole thing on me. Total bull, bc this happened after I brought them back. I assume M threw me under the bus
    via bingbong_Iamwrong
  • 11
    for being 'in charge' while he wasn't there. Also, we had hand signals!!! I tried explaining that to them, but they didn't give a sh. I refused to sign the paperwork which would be admitting fault, so this fight was stretched over multiple days. Plus I was leaving for college in like 2 weeks and didn't want to spend my last days of summer cleaning bathrooms.
    via bingbong_Iamwrong
  • 12
    They gave us a new rule: if a single radio was dong, we had to call a manager to fetch us a new battery even if we had people to spare to go grab one instead. If a radio dod, we had to close the ride. Managers roamed around the whole area and were responsible for sooooo much, so if you called them and it wasn't urgent, it could take a long time for them to show up. The next day, my radio was d ng, I called the manager, half
    via bingbong_Iamwrong
  • 13
    hour goes by, I call again. My radio d d. I shut down the ride. The people in the over-an-hour line got P ED. I explained to people that we had to close because of the radios. Naturally, they got even more p ed bc of how stupid that was. Manager shows up minutes later, I took the battery from him with a smile on my face and he left
    via bingbong_Iamwrong
  • 14
    without saying a word. After many complaints, management was magically fine with us using hand signals again! I never signed that paperwork, I left for college, and funny enough, M also went to the same college. I ran into him once, he just kinda nodded at me, I gave him a dirty look, and I never saw him again. The next summer, I was rehired by the park as a lead and actually did my job.
    via bingbong_Iamwrong
  • 15
    TLDR: When I was working at a theme park, we had several incidents of someone at my ride starting it up with people locked inside the gate. This happened again when I was there because our lead, who was at another ride, was sending over inexperienced people instead of coming back and helping us. Upper
    via bingbong_Iamwrong
  • 16
    management fired the guy who should've never been there, and my lead tried to blame it on me and get me sent to janitorial duty. I fought them, and they made up a rule stating that if a single radio battery d d, we had to close the ride until a manager brought us a new one. After I closed it down many times over the next few days. and got tons of complaints, they were okay with us getting the batteries ourselves/using hand signals again
    via bingbong_Iamwrong
  • 17
    A theme park operates with rides sky-lining against a cloudy sky
    via bingbong_Iamwrong
  • 18
    ZumboPrime Good on you for turning the crowd on the right people. What I want to know is why the f OP went back after they fired someone for hitting the e-stop correctly, and tried to blame the entire debacle on him.
    via bingbong_Iamwrong
  • 19
    evet I can't picture what you mean by "being locked in the fence" and "not in a seat". How do people wind up locked in the fence? Is the employee supposed to be in a seat, so it's a problem that the employee isn't in a seat?
    via bingbong_Iamwrong
  • 20
    HappyWarBunny Thanks for sharing. You might want to be a bit clearer about what "inside the gate" or "inside the fence" means. From context I figure it is a dangerous area, but it was still a bit unclear.
    via bingbong_Iamwrong

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