Can you do a vid on the Westgate Bridge collapse? It was one of five that happened around the same time that all had the same design. It changed the way that these types of bridges were constructed.
Have you done a video on the Fernald plants in southern Ohio, site of numerous radioactive waste releases and incidents in the 70s and 80s? Ohio is riddled with superfund sites and enough nuclear and industrial disasters (being a major hub for Dow chemical, GE, Proctor and Gamble, many other heavy industries) for an entire season of videos.
@@PlainlyDifficult how about discuss this scandal history= real clone wars is rhinos like bush=nute gunray invade naboo bush could of prevent europe migrant crisis since obama target Libya Sudan Somalia Syria was originally bush admin rumsfield idea pnac! we can give all medicare by reduce warfronts, no more allowing new daca abusers, force senators to cut their own wealth in gov by half if they want to keep above 70% of current daca population so inflation/living cost stay reasonable wesley clark foreshadow reveal 2000 to 2012 all rig for kill iraq to syria ua-cam.com/video/_mrJRHwbVG8/v-deo.html establishment kill 50 in vegas/portland, thugs attack with stand down cops san jose/charlotte, burn loot several months, sabotage afgan withdraw using russia bounty smear to give taliban equip, crash car in to wisconsin parade thanks to nbc follow jury bus smearing ritten house too ua-cam.com/video/UxoL8tHSa7g/v-deo.html bush 14y ago said add ukraine to nato with nuland f eu coup 2014 support = ua-cam.com/video/nTQ3D1a-j20/v-deo.html current ukraine gov is proxy since cia drew red line just like did in syria earlier arming rebels telling russia not to interfere while zelensky ethnic cleanse donbass region 7y= ua-cam.com/video/ta9dWRcDUPA/v-deo.html ua-cam.com/video/IBeRB7rWk_8/v-deo.html
The 21 yr old pilot of the monorail who died was Austin Wuennenberg. Wuennenberg's mother has settled her civil lawsuit with Disney over the death of her only son. In a statement, her attorney said, "She is satisfied with the terms of the agreement, but as any parent who has lost a child knows, it's a pain that never goes away."
@Brent Spar Settling means winning in civil cases. Massive businesses like Disney will never let you win, instead the settle for a sum of money and save face.
For kids they don't know any better and they are too young to be learning about employee mistreatment and the forced Child Labor of the Chinese government. For adults, they should feel ashamed that they aren't taking more action against companies that rely on Child Labor like that in the two countries mentioned, but they view it as it's not my kid so not my problem.
The worst one was an 18 year old cast member who got crushed to death on America Sings. It's a giant rotating room and she was standing in the wrong place when it started spinning. Really sad story.
@@oliverwells8011 Yep, and that's why all of the resort beaches and waterfronts now have fencing around them with prominent signs warning of alligators and snakes. There's also a small lighthouse memorial at Seven Seas Lagoon where it happened. As tragic as it was, I DO blame the parents. They allowed their two year old child - that didn't know how to swim - to play in _shallow fresh water at nightfall_ in FLORIDA when a kids' water play/pool area was literally a couple hundred feet away. I still cannot wrap my head around why on earth ANY parent would let their child do that! 😕
I’ve actually ridden in the front car with the driver on the monorail in California In the summer of 2009, he even let me and my siblings all honk the horn during the ride, the only reason we got to do it was because we had a medical fast pass and for whatever reason we weren’t boarded first and the train filled up before we could get on, the only place left was with the driver so they put us all up there which honing was the highlight of the trip for me because I was 10 and still a pretty big fan of trains at the time.
I remember getting to ride in the front car with the driver on different occasions at Disney's Anaheim park. I got to honk the horn on one of those rides.
I rode in the front in 2016. I think the policies are different between the two parks as there's no spur besides the one to the maintenance shed, and that's only used after hours.
Ironically, the Wuppertal suspended monorail (the one shown as a bad example in the picture where the elephant falls out of one of the carriages) is an integral part of Wuppertal's public transportation system and, despite being over 100 years old, is one of the most successful monorails in the world. Btw, the elephant survived :P
@@RCAvhstape Yeah, the Wuppertal monorail runs right above the river Wupper for a majority of the route. The river is not very deep though, it's a miracle the elephant was completely fine.
@@nobodynoone2500 According to the German Wikipedia article (which isn't always the best source), Tuffi felt threatened by the ruckus in the crowded wagon, crashed through its side wall and fell down into the Wupper. Which.. is technically neither jumping nor being thrown, I suppose.
I used to work with a guy who's wife worked at Disney World, she got hit by a truck in the maintenance tunnels and the company tried to sue her before she could sue them, Disney ended up settling out of court to protect their image, and didn't really leave my friend's wife any room to negotiate, as she needed about half a million dollars in surgery and therapy.
i use to work there as well they did nothing for me nor did the union when i had i a shelf fall off the wall that was installed wrong and it broke my shoulder. hadn't returned to disney since. i quiet a couple months after due to the pain
Story goes that employees of Disney were referring to the company as "Duckau". An e-mail coming down from on high threatened anyone using the word with dismissal. Half an hour later the employees referred to the company as "Mauschwitz".
There was a fatality on the not yet opened JFK Airport Monorail in 2002 when it derailed and struck a wall. The operator, who worked for a contractor, would have survived but was crushed by heavy unsecured concrete ballast in the car meant to simulate passengers.
the only time i've been to disney parks was on july 6-9 2009 lol, literally RIGHT after the crash. i remember it bc i was excited to ride it but we saw on the news at the hotel that there was a crash and it was shut down. i could probably find pictures from that trip since it's still my fav childhood memory, but it's so crazy.
Ok, I’m now thoroughly creeped out. I was at Disney World on holiday about a week after this happened in 2009 and had NO idea this accident had even occurred. Just shows how good Disney are at hiding this stuff I guess.
My wife and I worked at the CA park back in the early 2000’s. She was a monorail driver for about two years before moving to another department. She can still recall how to operate that thing. By the time this accident happened, we were long gone from that company, but I can tell you that there were a lot of questionable safety things I observed from my time there.
@@Plaksa2004 You know people get fired immediately for doing that, right? And if you just quit working there and then report it, they hit you with a SLAPP suit that you can't possibly afford to defend. Workers have no protection in the US. We have rights, but no means to enforce them without getting fired.
@@beenaplumber8379 well, I am from Russia so I have no idea how it works and how you can just fire someone without a reason, here in Russia you can not. Well, of course, if they want, they will find a way to show your failures and fire you then, so what? Ppl want to participate in the crimes and deaths of ppl just cause it`s the best job in the world with a 10000 dollar salary or what? Yes, you can just report and leave this job cause they kill ppl. And you can find another job just like that, which is not the best job in the world IMHO
@@Plaksa2004 It's true, here in the land of individual freedom (rolls eyes), employers can do that. State laws differ though. I live in MN, and employment is an "at will" agreement that can be terminated at any time by the employer or the employee for "any reason or for no reason", as out law says. However, if employees belong to a union, they have meaningful protections. Did Russia inherit the attitude of protection for the workers from the Communist days? Maybe most of Europe is like that? People don't always know how horrible a company is before they accept a job there. If they find out after beginning work, they might have had to sign contracts that prevent them from making derogatory statements about their employer or for working for any competitor for a period of years. Even if they haven't, SLAPP suits have been used by large corporations (ESPECIALLY by Trump and his corporations) to destroy people they don't like. A SLAPP suit is a civil lawsuit alleging libel or anything else they can dream up, and they sue for a ridiculous sum. The person being sued cannot afford to defend against such a lawsuit, so the wealthy people and corporations tend to get their way. We as individuals are not as free or protected from abuse as we like others to think we are. I love the US, I really do, but we have a LOT of things that need improvement. (I'm sure you can name many of them - gun violence, racial hatred, international hegemony, etc.)
Yeah a bit insane he was absolved from all guilty because he was concentrating…. apparently not focused enough to realize he timeout during the calls or check the cctv.
Welcome to America, The Land of the Freedom and American Dream, where the only thing free is capitalistic exploitation and dreaming of it is all you can do.
Where/what department did you work in? I've been friends with several cast members from different areas - some who have worked there for decades at this point - in everything from counter service, signature dining servers, merch, housekeeping, and guest services to even fur and face characters. None of them ever felt their working conditions were unsafe, so I'm genuinely curious to know.
A monorail driver literally let me drive the thing at 10 years old. You’d think the driver would set autopilot and make it appear I wasn’t. But no the dude literally shoved me off to take control when I sneezed and made the whole train jerk. It scares me, in retrospect, how much danger we had put the other passengers in.
If I remember correctly, the monorails at WDW do not have auto pilot. Train operations in the US all require some kind of dead-man's switch system to prevent a train from continuing if the operator is incapacitated. Smaller train networks would just have the dead-man's switch built into the speed control as the distances would be considered too short of even considering cruise-control/autopilot. Let go of the throttle and the train stops providing power to the wheels before coming to a stop. But yeah, that train operator never should have let you at the controls. Sounds similar to that story about a passenger-jet pilot letting his son jump into a plan's pilot seat, only for the plane to crash after his son accidentally disengaged Auto-Pilot.
I watch videos about plane crashes. There is one, I think Russian airline where the captain let his kids drive and his teenage son crashed the plane, killing everyone.
@@smilodon1976 Thank you! That story is crazy. The kid jerked the steering wheel thing to the side so hard it overrode the auto pilot. I couldn't believe it when they said if he would have just let go the auto pilot would have kicked back in and sorted everything out. I guess in the panic, that feature was forgotten. I know, as an American, we tend to be proactive and control oriented, and this was probably a similar culture. I wonder if they were from somewhere where people tend to be more passive and willing to accept circumstances as they are, of if would have ended differently.
It’s making me laugh so hard thinking of some kid sneezing, the entire train jerking, and the driver getting the shit scared out of him and taking back control
I was working at Magic Kingdom that day. It’s a day I’ll never forget. I got to the cast parking lot (which is behind MK and you have to take a bus to the utilidor from there) and at the bus stop it was utter chaos. All the monorails were shut down. There were confused guests everywhere trying to board the cast member bus. My phone was ringing non stop from my family calling because they saw the incident on the news and were asking if I was okay. I was new at Disney so I didn’t know the pilot directly but I knew lots of people who knew him. It was a very sad and dark day I’ll never forget. Luckily when I was a kid in 1998 I did get a chance to ride in the front of the monorail and I’m not gonna lie. It was truly one of the coolest experiences of my entire life. It’s sad no one can ride in the front anymore but I think it’s for the best. I’ve even ridden in the flight deck of a passenger plane after 9/11 and the monorail is actually way cooler than that!
Most people fail to explain the scenario. This accident happened on July 5 at 2am. The night of July 4th, the busiest day of the entire year for Disney World. During that week, the parks open an hour earlier than usual, and the Magic Kingdom hosts Extra Magic Hours for resort guests by opening an additional hour earlier. Then the park is kept open later than usual by closing at 1am. (During Christmas week, the Magic Kingdom will close at 1am with EMH for resort guests until 4am and reopen in just 3 hours). Because guests can go from park to park, they will often park in the morning and then use the internal system to get around. At closing time, the monorails will operate for one to two hours past closing to shuffle guests between the lots. This was also 2009... before the age of iphones/facetime/fancy phones. It was the height of Blackberry and full keyboards, and texting outweighed the use of the internet, if you even had it. So there wasn't likely any visuals by the supervisor off property. But I don't exactly blame the guy for finally getting a break to get something to eat. Managers don't really have that much more freedom when it comes to break times. So it isn't likely this manager was away from the TTC all night or something crazy. I used to ride all the time up front until they stopped it. I still would if they allowed it. But I can also see it from the perspective of unnecessary conversations of "did you know the guy?" "did you see it happen?" "what happened?" and not wanting to be that CM hearing it for the millionth time. It was a bunch of little errors that all lined up perfectly to create this, and most of that was probably brought on by shear exhaustion at the end of the day for the CM working.
If I recall the report correctly, the coordinator at the restaurant wasn't even scheduled to be on duty at the time. However the person who had been on duty, had some kind of medical emergency. So the person at the restaurant was the only one who was both qualified and available immediately.
The Disney Empire is really concerning to me. I've never been to any of their parks, but I've heard wonder/horror stories about them. How everything is so intricately catered to the experience from the sightlines to the smells, and to the "never break the magic, for the sake of the children" of it all while practically drinking your money with a straw. I'd much rather go to a park like Cedar Point where the rides ARE the attraction and you're not going to go broke for a fun day and/or vacation
Ive never had a horror story at any disney park ever. Your only real complaint is the pricing. Which it is expensive. Cedar point is a ton of fun tho but its a VERY different experience then disney.
I remember as a kid going into the cockpit of the monorail circa 2006. It was so friggin awesome. Monorails are still my favorite mode of transportation to this day. Kind of sad that kids won't be able to have that magical experience in the future but I guess if it's safer...
The real travesty is that it just about can't make it any safer. If everything IS really automated or handled by platform personnel, and the "pilots" are only there to baby-sit equipment and hit the E-brakes, then a distraction like a couple of kids almost can't possibly cause any harm... AND I'm sure a kid would start screaming and pointing if they saw the imminent emergency ahead, anyway... Kids are pretty good about that, if the adults in the room are paying attention. There's a difference between being prudent and just being silly about stuff. The cab-view was a fairly big attractant to guests and the monorail as a whole. ;o)
@@gnarthdarkanen7464 The reason visitors aren't allowed in the cab isn't about distractions. It's that IF there were visitors in that particular cab at the moment of the crash... It would have been SO MUCH worse for Disney. Regular train operators on regular rails (barring company policy strictly prohibiting it) will allow ride along in the cab in many places. Though it depends on who you ask and how you ask. As a kid i was allowed into many cabs. My goal was to visit every single different cab there was and where i live there were quite a few different locos. Nowadays i'd bet it much harder to get to ride along in the cab because the operators would fear administrative action against them when they do. But back then, the operator was like a captain. He/she set the rules really and all responsibility laid entirely on them. These days not so much, now everything is regulated. Even down to the clothes the operator may wear. Even on a superhot summers day, men aren't allowed to wear shorts. So quite a few operators take the only allowed action and wears a woman's skirt.
I asked because I was there in 1978 and got to "drive" the monorail...when I took my son in 2015 I was told Florida classifies their monorail as a mode of transport so like a bus, no riders past the yellow line while in motion...California classifies it as an amusement ride so you can still ride up front there..
A few heroic people in history have remained at their post when facing death for the good of others. Look up the wreck of the SS Arctic, for example… Austin Wuennenberg deserves to be remembered with the same respect. I want to believe I would do the same as him, but I fear I might not.
I think this incident would be closer to a 6 or 7 on the Legacy Scale. I work as a light rail operator on the other side of the US and we have a no backing up policy. We had our grand opening just after this incident, and if I remember correctly the policy has been active since then. If we have to reverse a train on the mainline, we have to get permission from control, who will stop traffic behind the train, then have the operator switch to the rear cab to move the train back. If a train has to reverse in the yard, they’ll either use a spotter or switch cabs as well. There is only one exception to this policy and it’s the Emergency Backup Procedure. It states that in a certain section of the underground alignment, the operator is allowed to reverse the train back to the previous station if they encounter a fire or heavy smoke.
I grew up in Orlando and I was about 10 or 11 when this happened. I remember hearing about the tragedy, but I never knew the full story. It's heartbreaking that decisions made by management lead to the death of a cast member.
The old MAPO system was based on SelTrac ATP - itself an upgrade from the original moving blocklight system that Disney developed with Standard Elektrik (later Standard Elektrik Lorenz, now Thales). The new system is SelTrac CBTC/R, a radio-based communications based train control (the same system used on the subsurface lines of London Underground). Drivers are now train managers, driving manually only into/out of the shop, and to keep practice in case of an ATO failure (ATP is separate, so a train can have a failure to self-drive, but still be driven manually with full protection of the signaling system). Platform staff do have interlock control through the load/unload consoles (which interface with the Station Controller Subsystem or PDIU, depending on how it was implemented) but the train will not move until the driver presses "ATO Start."
Thank you for that insight, I have first hand experience of seltrac s40 and it’s a nightmare, in the time the 2 vobc’s need to confirm the train is stationary before door release is available
@@PlainlyDifficult Was your experience on the JNP? I have a colleague that worked on that - I've never heard that much complaining: non-communicating trains, loss of axle counter blocks, TBTC cable damage, and as you mentioned, VOBCs that quit talking over their serial link and losing the 'round train circuit. My experience is with CityFlo 550, which is comparatively friendly...it doesn't self drive as nicely, but it hits its stopping marks without fail and is very forgiving of technical issues.
@@mobile_vic I worked on CityFlo in Pittsburgh. I know the PM systems had turnbacks, as do many metro systems I've worked on. For turnbacks, you have to switch ends (key-out, key-in), and you took both traffic directions when doing so. The monorail beam didn't have point or switch locked detectors which would've protected the route (standard on wayside signaling, and part of CBTC in the sense for a switch to be able to clear a route). If you want an interesting PD story, you might want to look at the Washington DC Metro (WMATA) Fort Totten crash. Many links in the chain of failure. Failure of track circuits leading to a manual car losing cab and stopping, and the following train getting a clear. WMATA is ATO, but the operators had the option to drive manually. If the first driver used ATO, he probably would've coasted through the bad track circuit, gotten back cab, and kept moving. As a signal engineer, it's very infuriating that it happened (your job is to prevent that exact thing). That crash is one of the crashes that got the NTSB/Federal Railroad Administration to get involved in transit... They used to claim they were private and not subject to US operating rules. If you want another interesting transit one, Angel's Flight funicular in San Francisco. Ones where things not working right is tolerated get my attention.
@@patrickvolk7031 Very cool! The number of things that the WDW Monorail system didn't have in the safety department was (and probably still is) shocking. Wrong way driving was the most frustrating of them - once should never drive a train on revenue track in reverse whether or not in revenue service. Ever. I think the Fort Totten Metro crash would make an excellent PD! I still don't understand the philosophy behind the original GRS design. In a sane world, such as the Westinghouse coded track ATP system used on LUL's Central Line, a loss of speed code == emergency stop. On WMATA, it just causes the train to stop drive, but not brake. My background is industrial engineering, not signals specifically, but why GRS ever thought that was a good idea is beyond me...
@@mobile_vic WMATA doesn't have speed signals - just red for stop, and white for follow cab. It allows them to use many different speeds for their profiles. In the US on freight and in transit, no code (loss of code) = restricted speed (be prepared to stop for obstruction, signal, or train, nominally 15 MPH). In transit, signals used to be protected by mechanical or impedence-based train stops. On the northeast corridor, RFID tags signal where the stop zone is, and they'll limit your speed as you approach the signal (ACSES {civil speed} + ATC = PTC) It's not uncommon for 'cab flips' (losses of signal) for a second or two due to switches and track circuits. You don't want to EB on those. For CBTC, loss of communications means your virtual block stops, and it's a hard stop. There was a lot of finger-pointing, because US&S were changing impedence bonds (necessary for continuous rail) at the time. It wasn't the loss of cab signal that caused the accident. The problem was the following train got a 55 MPH signal because the wayside thought the block was unoccupied (which is why it didn't send a cab signal). For some time, trains were reporting loss of cab signals, and the office was seeing occupancies go away. This went on for a while, and the problem was tolerated, and they tried to tune the track circuits. After the crash, it was realized that tracks wouldn't shunt (drop in US parlance) if you put a shunt strap on the track. Also, the track circuit stayed up even when you disconnected the track (which is why you run a signal through the track to protect against broken rail, obstructions, or occupancies). Closed loop, but had a wrong-side failure.
Loved your opening John; companies shouldn’t treat employees that way. ! As an American boomer from Illinois, I grew up watching Disneys Sunday night program on TV. When my husband & I visited LA in 2005, we went to Disneyland. We were tired & satisfied for the price. I cannot even imagine a place like Disney World. Not for me…
I worked for years in converting complex business processes, like you describe for the switch operator, into digital online equivalents. I’m always astounded at how bad many business processes are, and despite these objectively idiotic and stupid process steps they are sustained sometimes for decades. The cynic in me says people tolerate stupidly redundant and convoluted processes at work because they think it adds longevity and security to their job.
I think it’s often not intentional. Management decided some sort of framework a long time ago, certain processes were put in place there upon and even after management changes processes sometimes just “stay around”. “Thats just the way it is” is the most idiotic thing I often hear in companies.
@@Thesupermachine2000 I am not blaming the employees, sorry if I left that impression! You are right that if someone is trained on a method or sequence that they might often just keep it as standard. However people at the senior or management level have an obligation in my view to examine these systems and find more efficient ways and identify weaknesses. It’s a general complacency that sets in over time where no one, employees or boss, even thinks to wonder why.
@@MichaelEilers I work as a Technician for a very large Ford Dealer. We have alot of "outdated" processes. Whether safety related or whatever. Management is always more occupied with making more money and safety along with other necessary things get overlooked as "we will deal with it later" or "when someone finally gets hurt".
Management in-situ often fails to see any benefit to changing what they perceive to work fine, especially if changing it would require paying someone to fix it. For example, at my job, we are required to look at a computer screen and copy information by hand onto a workorder. It's human-unfriendly data like file names, date strings and other things. It requires multiple passes of look at screen/write it down to get all of it and people sometimes get it wrong or skip it altogether because this process takes too long. Since ALL of this data is already in the computer, I suggested we have the system generate these work orders, prepopulated with all the info and a barcode and all the user would need to do is write their name on it and sign it when done. This eliminates all that copying info by hand, reduce errors, save a ton of time, etc etc. No buy-in from management because they'd need to put a programmer on it instead of a client project. And they feel the existing system is fine because they never use it themselves.
Balls, the lack of clear procedures to double-check things are correct is scary. I recently did a railroad camp where we were operating equipment and we double-checked that the route was clear and that we had someone to act as a second set of eyes. And if at any point you were not sure, you stopped to double check! At one point backing a train up, I had to stop during a backing up move since a switch was thrown against me. Without that second set of eyes, things could have been bad.
As I recall, Disney had made all their operating rules into "guidelines" because it was too difficult/time consuming/costly to change the rules. So while it was still a "guideline" to have everything checked, it was no longer required.
Great video as always! If I may make a suggestion for your scandal series, A video about the British Beef BSE (mad cow disease) outbreak in the 80s and 90s, would be so interesting to hear you explain. I know it's not the kind of subject matter you normally do, but this incident in addition to being unbelievably scary, also had very tragic consequences for many of the millions of people who ate potentially contaminated British beef during that time period.
@@pinballrobbie I think in many states in the US blood donation bans like that are also still in place. I'm so sorry you had to experience that personally, what a scary disease to be exposed to.
I’m from the UK and this incident totally put me off eating beef. It still has. I was young at the time but I got the impression it was a random lottery who caught CJD from infected beef and the results were you’d have irreversible brain deterioration. I remember seeing footage of an infected cow who had no control of its limbs and could hardly stand up or walk, they were like Bambi on ice.
Wow this actually makes my experience getting on the monorail in September 2009 make so much more sense. The monorail was about to leave and my family and I were one of the last few who barely made it. We noticed there was nobody in the very front which we just chalked it up to being very lucky that maybe nobody knew they could ride up front with the driver. We had no idea about the accident that took place 2 months ago, but maybe would have not taken our chances had we known.
Disney may be seen by some as a ''magical'' company, but in reality, they are one of the shadiest, most bent, dirty and backhanded corps anywhere in the world. This happening is not surprising in the least. No wonder the daughter of Walt Disney wants nothing to do with them now.
I'm glad you said this. You said it in a (PR friendly) kind of way. I don't know how to do that. I speak short and true. That usually comes out as sharp and rude. But not always. I also tell how good of a job that was. Or just how beautiful that is (I don't even have feelings and I still am so attracted to your work). But, it is assured. That if the system is the spout that feeds you. There is going to be what you said. And a lot worse.
It's also a one-of-a-kind system that was initially built in 1901. As awesome as it is, it's worth remembering that there's a reason monorails didn't catch on as mass transit across the world - and they've definitely been around long enough to do so if they'd been worth the investment. It also adds a bit of interesting context to the idea that monorails "look futuristic." They're literally a rather dated piece of technology. It's the same thing with the hyper loop - it's just a recycled idea from the 1860s and one was actually built in London. There's a reason this stuff didn't take off and come to dominate transportation.
“And this is my favorite part of the video” *St. Judes commercial* The timing was impeccable. As always your video is entertaining and interesting all at once.
"Staffing issue" "Manager set up in a cafe working on his phone" Oh yeah. This was always going to be a disaster. Corporations are always wanting to understaff transportation and it always creates safety problems. In the US right now, we're in a President ordered 90 day arbitration period between the rail unions and rail companies and it's likely going to result in a rail strike or a lockout (or both) because rail companies want to reduce staffing and not raise wages and the unions are pissed because they've not gotten raises in several years and are extremely concerned about staffing shortages leading to unsafe conditions for both workers and the communities they pass through.
In fairness to the President transportation including rail is so critical you really can't have a strike. If folks won't work under contract they'll have to work at bayonet point. No it's not even slightly fair but it has to keep running understaffed or not. As an edit, don't take this as a political comment I can see left or right wing solutions to this issue that might work. There are simply two issues that make it hard to address. A lot of funding would have to be diverted from other more politically popular projects to fix it no matter whose solution you use. Secondly when it comes to wages and staffing we assume not only that there's a bottomless pit of money but that there's a bottomless pit of people willing to do the job. To a degree the two go hand in hand but as the saying goes it's not always that simple.
@@M167A1 As someone who lives about 10 yards away from one of the busiest rail lines in the country? I'm okay with a strike if it means I don't have to worry about a train derailing in my town (again). There's a train going by right as I'm typing this reply. Rail freight companies are making record profits. They can afford a pay raise and to hire more ppl. They can also afford to train new hires as well. I know that rail is critical to our supply lines and infrastructure. I also know that the current situation is untenable. The Department of Transportation should have acted in cooperation with the Army Corp of Engineers back in early 2021 when it became obvious that the backlog of ships off Pacific ports wasn't going to clear up and they should have begun work on new ports to help with the backlog. This entire situation is a complete failure of the Department of Transportation and our current leaders. But this is a "business-friendly" government - which means they put profits ahead of the people. That's something they've demonstrated over and over again in the past 2 years.
@@M167A1 There was no doubt from anyone involved that the President would appoint a PEB so a strike would not happen at this point. There could be a strike or lockout mid September. If that happens it would only last a hours before congress passed legislation to put the railroads back to work. The railroads want to effectively give their employees a pay cut while making them work more. There is a lot more to it than just that though.
You're welcome! I saw my first Plainly Difficult video about a year ago. I was instantly addicted. I don't remember which video it was but it was one of the nuclear incidents. Binge watched the whole channel. Lived through TMI and Chernobyl so I've always had an interest in those kind of events.
My family is from that area of Florida, an interesting aside is until air conditioning became accessible and Disneyworld arrived, it was a pretty desolate swampy hellhole primary used for cattle ranching, specifically for Brahmin cows because they thrive in hot climates. It's a part of why Disney bought the land there, it was cheap because it was unwanted by everyone except farmers.
you'd think they'd have a redundant safety system through the power delivery since the monorails are fed power through the tracks thus if in a certain block section it detects a powerdraw that would indicate two monorails drawing power (more power than 1 could use), it would send out warnings if not just outright kill power to the tram to stop them.
Monitoring power draw in each block section would definitely be a fairly simple way to tell if more than 1 train is in a section. If the draw approaches or exceeds roughly double normal, then it should trigger an alert. However, you'd need more separation, if two trains are in the same block its already too late (especially if they are moving in opposite directions). Power draw would still be a good way to tell if there's a train in any one section, as you could follow where each train is based on power draw in each block. You'd just have to keep one or two no power draw blocks between trains.
Simply monitoring for increased power draw won't work, since each train draws widely varying amounts of power - lots when it's accelerating, some when cruising, and little when stopping or stationary. However the basic idea has merit. I think it could be made to work using power flow sensors spaced relatively frequently along the track. If the power flow into and out of an area are different then the area contains at least one train, otherwise it is empty. Such a system would have been infeasible when the monorail was built, but with modern electronics it can be done. Another possibility would be upgrading MAPO with a much greater number of trackside nodes and giving them the ability to receive as well as transmit, so that train positions could be shown on a fine-grained map. Again this would have been infeasible when the monorail was built, but today, digital signal processing and networked communications have become much more powerful and much less expensive.
So, in an OS, there are mutex to avoid this scenario. The pink train should not be able to reverse without permission from the switcher only. The radio should not be used by other trains while switching; the other trains can brake and wait if they need a decision from dispatch before continuing. The block warning system should warn you regardless of the direction; reversing was necessary for normal operation so there is absolutely no reason for that to have been overlooked.
Happiest place on earth indeed... Also as a long-time OpenTTD fan/player I absolutely very much appreciate/share the consistent and succinct explanations/affection for signalling dynamics. It's a beautiful thing. When it works as it should that is.
Hey John! I just wanted to say that this could possibly be your best videos yet! No I'm not exaggerating or talking out my arse, I really do mean it. You seriously nailed this one! Here's my reasons (in a list cuz I'm lazy): •You explained everything clearly and concisely. (as per usual) •The video was long enough that nothing felt rushed or overlooked, yet short enough to leave me wanting more. (some voodoo shit if I've ever seen it) •It was highly engaging. (I almost always only listen to UA-cam videos; ADHD makes it nearly impossible for me to watch them... I watched this one. You riveted my attention without resorting to flashy lights and jump cuts! Bravo!) •The very best part of this video was the writing. I have a deep appreciation for good words John, and these were good words. Study the intro to this video my friend, cuz those first few minutes were written by a god. 1̶1̶/̶1̶0̶ 12/10.
I worked at Disney World in the Monorail Pilot role back in 2013. This was an incident that no one, and I mean no one, was allowed to publicly speak about. We were required to deflect any and all conversation from guests that involved the accident, Austin, Monorail Pink, and Monorail Purple, etc. The only way I really found out the details was when I was smoking a cigarette with a Monorail Pilot who was on-scene on the platform during the accident coordinating the evacuation of guests and trying to see about Austin until EMS arrived. To this day, it troubles him to speak of it, but he wants to let all platform operators who are about to train to become pilots to know exactly what happened and why safety is of the utmost concern in our role. If you ever wondered why those in the Monorail role can be a bit short sometimes or why they freak out when a guest starts to climb on the gate, it’s for the reason of safety. That rail is electrified to 600 VDC and they will not hesitate for a second to remotely disconnect power at a platform if at any time they feel the safety of guests is in question. They will hold up the train as long as it takes to restore order. Any questions, please ask away :)
@Madame d'Badger well, we could talk about it when out of the earshot of guests, however, it wasn’t a topic that was exactly mentioned ad nauseam after over four years since the accident. I personally knew Austin (Pilot of Purple) when I was a College Program Intern back in 2007. That was also back when interns could become pilots (which stopped after 2009). He was a really nice guy. No one ever had a bad thing to say about him. When I had heard that a pilot had died and that it was Austin, I grieved for him and his family. After the accident, the slogan of “One Rail, One Family” emerged and became a tie that still binds current and former pilots alike to this day.
@@Plaksa2004 ok, simply put, they didn’t want us talking about it while “on-stage” aka on the clock with guests. As cast members, we are/were responsible for the image of Disney. It isn’t very “magical” to discuss the accident. The last thing a kid wants to hear is how the monorail they are about to ride was the cause of death of another person.
Mr. Difficult, You could do an entire year's worth of videos just on Disney, and they could cover every different "theme" you have! Human Folly Disasters, Scandals, The Dark Side Of Science, Strange Places, and I'm pretty sure there's a whole MESS of other stuff in there! Ah, monorail... Takes me back to when I got the Lego Futuron Monorail Transport System for Christmas & Birthday in 1990 or 91 or so. And of course, the Simpsons episode!
I've heard about it before... BUT for the LIFE of me, it just FEELS like the kind of thing you'd expect to hear about the 90's or earlier... I kind of wonder what Disney ride actually has the highest body-count per park... if there is such a record... Just a morbid spot of curiosity... I'd lay money, though, just from what I HAVE heard and read up about Disney parks and accidents, that it's something like the monorail, people mover(s) or a similar attraction/ride something... They all move relatively slowly on a sedate and smooth track/system. I'm guessing that's how guests and visitors and probably even staff let themselves get complacent about safety rules because it's so easy to under-estimate the actual hazards. ANYWAYS... Good retelling and summary/breakdown of the whole incident! Keep up the great job! ;o)
I can just imagine some smartarse from the NTSB turning up, seeing the mess and asking immediately "What kinda mickey mouse operation are you guys running here?!?", and promptly getting his rear kicked off site... :P
I only think of the Simpsons when monorails are mentioned. Great video, never heard of this before but there's a lot to do with Disney that they keep buried
While on occasion people have died at Disney World, not surprising given the vast crowds, the company long had an agreement with the authorities that the death certificates would show the hospitals where the unfortunate people were taken as the official places of death. Never Disney World itself. It was impossible to maintain this fiction with the monorail crash, however, as rescuers spent a prolonged time extricating the obviously dead operator from the wreckage. Disney quietly changed its policy.
Talking about the elephant of the Wuppertaler Schwebebahn (hanging monorail of Wiuppertal): There is no outside photograph of the incident at all. This is a montage that was sold as a postcard to tourists. Tuffi from the Circus Althoff was still quite young, and taken into a wagon for a publicity stunt, but the keeper underestimated the fear of height of the poor beast. It broke through the wall, bailed out, and fell into the river below (most of the line is running right above the river Wupper, in order to keep the streets free). Fortunately, the animal only suffered a few bruises. Apart from this curios case, the line every now and then experienced accidents, mostly caused by human error. Most were minor ones, but on April 1999, after the replacement of a part of the supporting scaffolding, someone had forgotten to remove a maintenance clamp, derailing a car so forcefully that it fell down. This incident took 5 lives. Since then, the line is first checked by an empty car each time similar maintenance work has been done, to make sure this will happen never again.
I remember as a kid sometime in the mid 2000s my father convinced the monorail operator to let us ride in the driver's cab with him while the monorail went down its course. It was quite an experience that'll stick with me for a long time to come. Guess I was lucky enough to catch it before the accident happened.
I wonder how much training the panel operator had regarding the switch control panel's ability to time out and reset (which strikes me as a pretty dangerous design that was just waiting to contribute to an accident).
There's an amusement park named 'Phantasialand' near Cologne in Germany, and when our family went there for the first time in the late 70's, 8-year old me was impressed the most by the monorail there, too! 😁 And I was also impressed when going back nearly 25 years later and that monorail was still operating! 😊 And that elefant in your photo had jumped out of the 'Schwebebahn' in Wuppertal into the Wupper river below in 1950; It belonged to a circus, and its owner had put the elefant on that train as a promotional gag - but the elefant didn't like it! Luckily it survived the drop nearly unharmed 😊
My thoughts are the procedures didn't memtion keeping their eyes open either, but when controlling the trains you should be in the control room with your eyes open. Enjoying a late supper. Really enjoying your personality coming thru in your narrative more. I'd hazard to say, we're pretty much all of a same mind and humor around here. Great video as always, thank you
I love me some banter at the beginning of videos. Going to Disney 3 times (2x as a kid, 1x as an adult) I realize that it's a magical place, but an incredibley expensive place as well. 😭
@@PlainlyDifficult If I were to spend that much on a trip, I would buy a ticket down to Antartica on a ship. It maybe just me, but Disney has never done much for me, even as a little one 🤷♀️
I used to go wien it was $20 and it still seemed a bit steep. How the hell you rationalize hundreds of dollars is crazy. Thousands? You need to be locked up. Go to an actual place and invest the rest in your family. Blowing over $20k on a straight to dvd value add is insanely wasteful to your future. Literally WTF.
I am going with my fiancé in November. With park tickets, flights, hotel and food factored in it was $2,000. That was less than our other options of a sandals resort type thing, or a cruise.
As one of the first trained drivers on the EPCOT beam I can tell you that there used to be a maintenance man physically on the ground AT the switch any time a switch was moved. Obviously they cut personnel else this would never have happened.
ive started studying animation because of my dissatisfaction with the products and actions of the company. People want to watch traditionally animated content, im going to make cartoons i think are appealing and see if other people like them too.
Way back in the mid 70's, when I was a small kid, my family went to Disney Florida. We were getting off some ride, I don't remember which, and my mother was the last to disembark. The car was hit by the next car behind, and my mother was knocked to the ground, twisting her ankle very badly. A piece of paper was immediately thrust into her face for her to sign, which she did, being in a bit of a daze. Later I found out it was some sort of waiver that got Disney off the hook. Maybe it could have been fought, and some compensation received, but my parents didn't think it worth the trouble. It was our last day there anyway before the long drive north again. Since then, I've been suspicious whenever somebody thrusts a paper in my face with a demand to sign. This has sometimes lead to loud and vigorous discussions. But now, as a 50 something crusty old grey bearded SOB, nobody is surprised by this.
Yeah. I find it funny when they start acting confused and angry when I read the contract before signing it. Walked from some contracts that were clearly sketchy when you broke them down.
Every other time I heard this story I was under the impression it was driver error/distraction and the one who was worse off was the FORWARD driving pink driver. This version (as opposed to the basic quick version on other channels) makes so much more sense as to what sequence of errors needed to happen to result in this trajedy...
I recently created a second channel for my music, check it out and let me know what you think! ua-cam.com/video/rr_-qC0p3QM/v-deo.html
Can you do a vid on the Westgate Bridge collapse? It was one of five that happened around the same time that all had the same design. It changed the way that these types of bridges were constructed.
Thanks for the suggestion
Have you done a video on the Fernald plants in southern Ohio, site of numerous radioactive waste releases and incidents in the 70s and 80s? Ohio is riddled with superfund sites and enough nuclear and industrial disasters (being a major hub for Dow chemical, GE, Proctor and Gamble, many other heavy industries) for an entire season of videos.
Why don't the trains have backup cameras?
@@PlainlyDifficult how about discuss this scandal history=
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The 21 yr old pilot of the monorail who died was Austin Wuennenberg. Wuennenberg's mother has settled her civil lawsuit with Disney over the death of her only son. In a statement, her attorney said, "She is satisfied with the terms of the agreement, but as any parent who has lost a child knows, it's a pain that never goes away."
@Brent Spar They always refuse to let anyone know how much they pay in settlements.
@Brent Spar Settling means winning in civil cases. Massive businesses like Disney will never let you win, instead the settle for a sum of money and save face.
The agreement was that Disney wouldn't suicide her other children?
_May young Austin rest in eternal peace._ 🏵🌺🏵
@@abrunosON she didn't *have* any other children.
"I was a child and thus, an idiot"
I approve of this child slander.
For kids they don't know any better and they are too young to be learning about employee mistreatment and the forced Child Labor of the Chinese government. For adults, they should feel ashamed that they aren't taking more action against companies that rely on Child Labor like that in the two countries mentioned, but they view it as it's not my kid so not my problem.
As a parent of 3 its harsh but true lol
As a thirty year old child I most certainly do not! 😂
Losing someone you know at a place like Disney world would be an awful experience to say the least for MANY reasons
The worst one was an 18 year old cast member who got crushed to death on America Sings. It's a giant rotating room and she was standing in the wrong place when it started spinning. Really sad story.
I cannot see why it would be any less awful experience anywhere else as you are clearly insinuating.
@@abletothink 2017 a 2 y/o was killed by an alligator at Disney Orlando
@@oliverwells8011 Yep, and that's why all of the resort beaches and waterfronts now have fencing around them with prominent signs warning of alligators and snakes. There's also a small lighthouse memorial at Seven Seas Lagoon where it happened.
As tragic as it was, I DO blame the parents. They allowed their two year old child - that didn't know how to swim - to play in _shallow fresh water at nightfall_ in FLORIDA when a kids' water play/pool area was literally a couple hundred feet away. I still cannot wrap my head around why on earth ANY parent would let their child do that! 😕
@@anteshell same here
I’ve actually ridden in the front car with the driver on the monorail in California In the summer of 2009, he even let me and my siblings all honk the horn during the ride, the only reason we got to do it was because we had a medical fast pass and for whatever reason we weren’t boarded first and the train filled up before we could get on, the only place left was with the driver so they put us all up there which honing was the highlight of the trip for me because I was 10 and still a pretty big fan of trains at the time.
I remember getting to ride in the front car with the driver on different occasions at Disney's Anaheim park. I got to honk the horn on one of those rides.
I rode in the front in 2016. I think the policies are different between the two parks as there's no spur besides the one to the maintenance shed, and that's only used after hours.
I don't think he ever worked at Disneyland only Walt Disney World where this happened. Austin was a good kid.
I heard Disneyland still allows you to ride up front.
Disneyland (Anaheim) still allows cab rides, the monorail track there is just a loop and there are no backing operations
Ironically, the Wuppertal suspended monorail (the one shown as a bad example in the picture where the elephant falls out of one of the carriages) is an integral part of Wuppertal's public transportation system and, despite being over 100 years old, is one of the most successful monorails in the world.
Btw, the elephant survived :P
And it wasn't thrown. It jumped. ^^
@@suspended_top_spin It was encouraged to jump.
Did it land in water?
@@RCAvhstape Yeah, the Wuppertal monorail runs right above the river Wupper for a majority of the route. The river is not very deep though, it's a miracle the elephant was completely fine.
@@nobodynoone2500 According to the German Wikipedia article (which isn't always the best source), Tuffi felt threatened by the ruckus in the crowded wagon, crashed through its side wall and fell down into the Wupper. Which.. is technically neither jumping nor being thrown, I suppose.
I used to work with a guy who's wife worked at Disney World, she got hit by a truck in the maintenance tunnels and the company tried to sue her before she could sue them, Disney ended up settling out of court to protect their image, and didn't really leave my friend's wife any room to negotiate, as she needed about half a million dollars in surgery and therapy.
That sounds like Disney all right
i use to work there as well they did nothing for me nor did the union when i had i a shelf fall off the wall that was installed wrong and it broke my shoulder. hadn't returned to disney since. i quiet a couple months after due to the pain
Story goes that employees of Disney were referring to the company as "Duckau". An e-mail coming down from on high threatened anyone using the word with dismissal. Half an hour later the employees referred to the company as "Mauschwitz".
I am your nephews, sisters, former roommate.
"I was a child, thus an idiot." I mean, at least he's honest. I can drink to that.
Bon appetite
Some people never grow out of the idiot phase alas! 😁
There was a fatality on the not yet opened JFK Airport Monorail in 2002 when it derailed and struck a wall. The operator, who worked for a contractor, would have survived but was crushed by heavy unsecured concrete ballast in the car meant to simulate passengers.
Real passengers would have crushed the operator for making them miss their plane.
Geez… how unfortunate.
There is no monorail at JFK.
@@SoilantGreen The JFK People Mover mostly but not entirely uses a monorail design, and is classified as one.
@@R32R38 Classified by whom? Two steel rails don't make it a monorail just because it's elevated.
I hadn't even heard of this. Then again, Disney has a vast dark history that's been hidden with a friendly exterior.
Sadly true
Shh the mouse will here you
I'll never go
History? It's still happening now.
Yup. Could make a while host of videos under all of Mr. Difficult's different themes, and he could have content for at LEAST a year.
the only time i've been to disney parks was on july 6-9 2009 lol, literally RIGHT after the crash. i remember it bc i was excited to ride it but we saw on the news at the hotel that there was a crash and it was shut down. i could probably find pictures from that trip since it's still my fav childhood memory, but it's so crazy.
Ok, I’m now thoroughly creeped out. I was at Disney World on holiday about a week after this happened in 2009 and had NO idea this accident had even occurred. Just shows how good Disney are at hiding this stuff I guess.
What, did you want them to advertise is?
@@coreyhardwick4660
You’re missing the point. It was a tragedy that happened at one of the most popular places on earth.🙄
My wife and I worked at the CA park back in the early 2000’s. She was a monorail driver for about two years before moving to another department. She can still recall how to operate that thing. By the time this accident happened, we were long gone from that company, but I can tell you that there were a lot of questionable safety things I observed from my time there.
So did you report about all of them? If not it's one of the reasons that happens..
@@Plaksa2004 You know people get fired immediately for doing that, right? And if you just quit working there and then report it, they hit you with a SLAPP suit that you can't possibly afford to defend. Workers have no protection in the US. We have rights, but no means to enforce them without getting fired.
@@beenaplumber8379 well, I am from Russia so I have no idea how it works and how you can just fire someone without a reason, here in Russia you can not. Well, of course, if they want, they will find a way to show your failures and fire you then, so what? Ppl want to participate in the crimes and deaths of ppl just cause it`s the best job in the world with a 10000 dollar salary or what? Yes, you can just report and leave this job cause they kill ppl. And you can find another job just like that, which is not the best job in the world IMHO
@@Plaksa2004 It's true, here in the land of individual freedom (rolls eyes), employers can do that. State laws differ though. I live in MN, and employment is an "at will" agreement that can be terminated at any time by the employer or the employee for "any reason or for no reason", as out law says. However, if employees belong to a union, they have meaningful protections.
Did Russia inherit the attitude of protection for the workers from the Communist days? Maybe most of Europe is like that?
People don't always know how horrible a company is before they accept a job there. If they find out after beginning work, they might have had to sign contracts that prevent them from making derogatory statements about their employer or for working for any competitor for a period of years. Even if they haven't, SLAPP suits have been used by large corporations (ESPECIALLY by Trump and his corporations) to destroy people they don't like.
A SLAPP suit is a civil lawsuit alleging libel or anything else they can dream up, and they sue for a ridiculous sum. The person being sued cannot afford to defend against such a lawsuit, so the wealthy people and corporations tend to get their way. We as individuals are not as free or protected from abuse as we like others to think we are. I love the US, I really do, but we have a LOT of things that need improvement. (I'm sure you can name many of them - gun violence, racial hatred, international hegemony, etc.)
To operate the switch without looking at cctv is like trying to operate a tower crane without looking at the hook. Insane stuff.
Yeah a bit insane he was absolved from all guilty because he was concentrating…. apparently not focused enough to realize he timeout during the calls or check the cctv.
Worked there for years (after this). We were mandated to work in unsafe conditions almost daily.
That’s horrible
Welcome to America, The Land of the Freedom and American Dream, where the only thing free is capitalistic exploitation and dreaming of it is all you can do.
Where/what department did you work in? I've been friends with several cast members from different areas - some who have worked there for decades at this point - in everything from counter service, signature dining servers, merch, housekeeping, and guest services to even fur and face characters. None of them ever felt their working conditions were unsafe, so I'm genuinely curious to know.
I used to date a “Jasmine” character. She was Hispanic not Arabic though.
@@painful-Jay I used to be online friends with the main Aladdin in Epcot and he was Hispanic, too. He made for a great Aladdin though!
A monorail driver literally let me drive the thing at 10 years old. You’d think the driver would set autopilot and make it appear I wasn’t. But no the dude literally shoved me off to take control when I sneezed and made the whole train jerk.
It scares me, in retrospect, how much danger we had put the other passengers in.
If I remember correctly, the monorails at WDW do not have auto pilot.
Train operations in the US all require some kind of dead-man's switch system to prevent a train from continuing if the operator is incapacitated. Smaller train networks would just have the dead-man's switch built into the speed control as the distances would be considered too short of even considering cruise-control/autopilot. Let go of the throttle and the train stops providing power to the wheels before coming to a stop.
But yeah, that train operator never should have let you at the controls. Sounds similar to that story about a passenger-jet pilot letting his son jump into a plan's pilot seat, only for the plane to crash after his son accidentally disengaged Auto-Pilot.
I watch videos about plane crashes. There is one, I think Russian airline where the captain let his kids drive and his teenage son crashed the plane, killing everyone.
@@poutinedream5066 Aeroflot 593 in 1994: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aeroflot_Flight_593
@@smilodon1976 Thank you! That story is crazy. The kid jerked the steering wheel thing to the side so hard it overrode the auto pilot. I couldn't believe it when they said if he would have just let go the auto pilot would have kicked back in and sorted everything out. I guess in the panic, that feature was forgotten. I know, as an American, we tend to be proactive and control oriented, and this was probably a similar culture. I wonder if they were from somewhere where people tend to be more passive and willing to accept circumstances as they are, of if would have ended differently.
It’s making me laugh so hard thinking of some kid sneezing, the entire train jerking, and the driver getting the shit scared out of him and taking back control
I was working at Magic Kingdom that day. It’s a day I’ll never forget. I got to the cast parking lot (which is behind MK and you have to take a bus to the utilidor from there) and at the bus stop it was utter chaos. All the monorails were shut down. There were confused guests everywhere trying to board the cast member bus.
My phone was ringing non stop from my family calling because they saw the incident on the news and were asking if I was okay.
I was new at Disney so I didn’t know the pilot directly but I knew lots of people who knew him. It was a very sad and dark day I’ll never forget.
Luckily when I was a kid in 1998 I did get a chance to ride in the front of the monorail and I’m not gonna lie. It was truly one of the coolest experiences of my entire life. It’s sad no one can ride in the front anymore but I think it’s for the best.
I’ve even ridden in the flight deck of a passenger plane after 9/11 and the monorail is actually way cooler than that!
Most people fail to explain the scenario. This accident happened on July 5 at 2am. The night of July 4th, the busiest day of the entire year for Disney World. During that week, the parks open an hour earlier than usual, and the Magic Kingdom hosts Extra Magic Hours for resort guests by opening an additional hour earlier. Then the park is kept open later than usual by closing at 1am. (During Christmas week, the Magic Kingdom will close at 1am with EMH for resort guests until 4am and reopen in just 3 hours).
Because guests can go from park to park, they will often park in the morning and then use the internal system to get around. At closing time, the monorails will operate for one to two hours past closing to shuffle guests between the lots.
This was also 2009... before the age of iphones/facetime/fancy phones. It was the height of Blackberry and full keyboards, and texting outweighed the use of the internet, if you even had it. So there wasn't likely any visuals by the supervisor off property. But I don't exactly blame the guy for finally getting a break to get something to eat. Managers don't really have that much more freedom when it comes to break times. So it isn't likely this manager was away from the TTC all night or something crazy.
I used to ride all the time up front until they stopped it. I still would if they allowed it. But I can also see it from the perspective of unnecessary conversations of "did you know the guy?" "did you see it happen?" "what happened?" and not wanting to be that CM hearing it for the millionth time.
It was a bunch of little errors that all lined up perfectly to create this, and most of that was probably brought on by shear exhaustion at the end of the day for the CM working.
If I recall the report correctly, the coordinator at the restaurant wasn't even scheduled to be on duty at the time. However the person who had been on duty, had some kind of medical emergency. So the person at the restaurant was the only one who was both qualified and available immediately.
Keep up the difficult work fella and, as always, stay safe!
Thank you
The Disney Empire is really concerning to me. I've never been to any of their parks, but I've heard wonder/horror stories about them. How everything is so intricately catered to the experience from the sightlines to the smells, and to the "never break the magic, for the sake of the children" of it all while practically drinking your money with a straw.
I'd much rather go to a park like Cedar Point where the rides ARE the attraction and you're not going to go broke for a fun day and/or vacation
i loev cedar point
The rides aren't even any better than the ones at a generic amusement park.
@@wta1518 are you talking about the disney empire or cedar fair?
@@AngryGamer1224 Disney
Ive never had a horror story at any disney park ever. Your only real complaint is the pricing. Which it is expensive. Cedar point is a ton of fun tho but its a VERY different experience then disney.
I remember as a kid going into the cockpit of the monorail circa 2006. It was so friggin awesome. Monorails are still my favorite mode of transportation to this day. Kind of sad that kids won't be able to have that magical experience in the future but I guess if it's safer...
No more monorail?
@@joshuakuehn no it's still there, you just can't go up into the cockpit anymore. It was a view you can't get anywhere else
The real travesty is that it just about can't make it any safer. If everything IS really automated or handled by platform personnel, and the "pilots" are only there to baby-sit equipment and hit the E-brakes, then a distraction like a couple of kids almost can't possibly cause any harm... AND I'm sure a kid would start screaming and pointing if they saw the imminent emergency ahead, anyway... Kids are pretty good about that, if the adults in the room are paying attention.
There's a difference between being prudent and just being silly about stuff. The cab-view was a fairly big attractant to guests and the monorail as a whole. ;o)
@@gnarthdarkanen7464 The reason visitors aren't allowed in the cab isn't about distractions. It's that IF there were visitors in that particular cab at the moment of the crash... It would have been SO MUCH worse for Disney.
Regular train operators on regular rails (barring company policy strictly prohibiting it) will allow ride along in the cab in many places. Though it depends on who you ask and how you ask.
As a kid i was allowed into many cabs. My goal was to visit every single different cab there was and where i live there were quite a few different locos.
Nowadays i'd bet it much harder to get to ride along in the cab because the operators would fear administrative action against them when they do.
But back then, the operator was like a captain. He/she set the rules really and all responsibility laid entirely on them.
These days not so much, now everything is regulated. Even down to the clothes the operator may wear. Even on a superhot summers day, men aren't allowed to wear shorts. So quite a few operators take the only allowed action and wears a woman's skirt.
I asked because I was there in 1978 and got to "drive" the monorail...when I took my son in 2015 I was told Florida classifies their monorail as a mode of transport so like a bus, no riders past the yellow line while in motion...California classifies it as an amusement ride so you can still ride up front there..
The whole reason I subscribed to this channel is because of the great documentaries of “the folly of mankind in the form of its bugger ups.”
A few heroic people in history have remained at their post when facing death for the good of others. Look up the wreck of the SS Arctic, for example… Austin Wuennenberg deserves to be remembered with the same respect. I want to believe I would do the same as him, but I fear I might not.
I think this incident would be closer to a 6 or 7 on the Legacy Scale. I work as a light rail operator on the other side of the US and we have a no backing up policy. We had our grand opening just after this incident, and if I remember correctly the policy has been active since then. If we have to reverse a train on the mainline, we have to get permission from control, who will stop traffic behind the train, then have the operator switch to the rear cab to move the train back. If a train has to reverse in the yard, they’ll either use a spotter or switch cabs as well. There is only one exception to this policy and it’s the Emergency Backup Procedure. It states that in a certain section of the underground alignment, the operator is allowed to reverse the train back to the previous station if they encounter a fire or heavy smoke.
I agree that the legacy scale rating should be 6 or 7, as someone who grew up in florida it was very much talked about.
What about simply putting cameras at each end that send the picture to the other end of the train?
This episode is PEAK. Plainly Difficult narration. The introduction was incredible. *Chef's kiss*
Thank you!
No john. THANK YOU. You've done nothing but teach and entertain me every time I watch one of these videos.
I grew up in Orlando and I was about 10 or 11 when this happened. I remember hearing about the tragedy, but I never knew the full story. It's heartbreaking that decisions made by management lead to the death of a cast member.
The old MAPO system was based on SelTrac ATP - itself an upgrade from the original moving blocklight system that Disney developed with Standard Elektrik (later Standard Elektrik Lorenz, now Thales). The new system is SelTrac CBTC/R, a radio-based communications based train control (the same system used on the subsurface lines of London Underground). Drivers are now train managers, driving manually only into/out of the shop, and to keep practice in case of an ATO failure (ATP is separate, so a train can have a failure to self-drive, but still be driven manually with full protection of the signaling system). Platform staff do have interlock control through the load/unload consoles (which interface with the Station Controller Subsystem or PDIU, depending on how it was implemented) but the train will not move until the driver presses "ATO Start."
Thank you for that insight, I have first hand experience of seltrac s40 and it’s a nightmare, in the time the 2 vobc’s need to confirm the train is stationary before door release is available
@@PlainlyDifficult Was your experience on the JNP? I have a colleague that worked on that - I've never heard that much complaining: non-communicating trains, loss of axle counter blocks, TBTC cable damage, and as you mentioned, VOBCs that quit talking over their serial link and losing the 'round train circuit. My experience is with CityFlo 550, which is comparatively friendly...it doesn't self drive as nicely, but it hits its stopping marks without fail and is very forgiving of technical issues.
@@mobile_vic I worked on CityFlo in Pittsburgh. I know the PM systems had turnbacks, as do many metro systems I've worked on. For turnbacks, you have to switch ends (key-out, key-in), and you took both traffic directions when doing so. The monorail beam didn't have point or switch locked detectors which would've protected the route (standard on wayside signaling, and part of CBTC in the sense for a switch to be able to clear a route).
If you want an interesting PD story, you might want to look at the Washington DC Metro (WMATA) Fort Totten crash. Many links in the chain of failure. Failure of track circuits leading to a manual car losing cab and stopping, and the following train getting a clear. WMATA is ATO, but the operators had the option to drive manually. If the first driver used ATO, he probably would've coasted through the bad track circuit, gotten back cab, and kept moving. As a signal engineer, it's very infuriating that it happened (your job is to prevent that exact thing).
That crash is one of the crashes that got the NTSB/Federal Railroad Administration to get involved in transit... They used to claim they were private and not subject to US operating rules. If you want another interesting transit one, Angel's Flight funicular in San Francisco. Ones where things not working right is tolerated get my attention.
@@patrickvolk7031 Very cool! The number of things that the WDW Monorail system didn't have in the safety department was (and probably still is) shocking. Wrong way driving was the most frustrating of them - once should never drive a train on revenue track in reverse whether or not in revenue service. Ever.
I think the Fort Totten Metro crash would make an excellent PD! I still don't understand the philosophy behind the original GRS design. In a sane world, such as the Westinghouse coded track ATP system used on LUL's Central Line, a loss of speed code == emergency stop. On WMATA, it just causes the train to stop drive, but not brake. My background is industrial engineering, not signals specifically, but why GRS ever thought that was a good idea is beyond me...
@@mobile_vic WMATA doesn't have speed signals - just red for stop, and white for follow cab. It allows them to use many different speeds for their profiles.
In the US on freight and in transit, no code (loss of code) = restricted speed (be prepared to stop for obstruction, signal, or train, nominally 15 MPH). In transit, signals used to be protected by mechanical or impedence-based train stops. On the northeast corridor, RFID tags signal where the stop zone is, and they'll limit your speed as you approach the signal (ACSES {civil speed} + ATC = PTC)
It's not uncommon for 'cab flips' (losses of signal) for a second or two due to switches and track circuits. You don't want to EB on those.
For CBTC, loss of communications means your virtual block stops, and it's a hard stop.
There was a lot of finger-pointing, because US&S were changing impedence bonds (necessary for continuous rail) at the time.
It wasn't the loss of cab signal that caused the accident. The problem was the following train got a 55 MPH signal because the wayside thought the block was unoccupied (which is why it didn't send a cab signal).
For some time, trains were reporting loss of cab signals, and the office was seeing occupancies go away. This went on for a while, and the problem was tolerated, and they tried to tune the track circuits.
After the crash, it was realized that tracks wouldn't shunt (drop in US parlance) if you put a shunt strap on the track. Also, the track circuit stayed up even when you disconnected the track (which is why you run a signal through the track to protect against broken rail, obstructions, or occupancies). Closed loop, but had a wrong-side failure.
Loved your opening John; companies shouldn’t treat employees that way.
! As an American boomer from Illinois, I grew up watching Disneys Sunday night program on TV.
When my husband & I visited LA in 2005, we went to Disneyland. We were tired & satisfied for the price.
I cannot even imagine a place like Disney World. Not for me…
You should do a video covering the Senior Road television tower collapse. I think that event is perfect for this channel.
Thanks for the suggestion
I worked for years in converting complex business processes, like you describe for the switch operator, into digital online equivalents. I’m always astounded at how bad many business processes are, and despite these objectively idiotic and stupid process steps they are sustained sometimes for decades. The cynic in me says people tolerate stupidly redundant and convoluted processes at work because they think it adds longevity and security to their job.
I think it’s often not intentional. Management decided some sort of framework a long time ago, certain processes were put in place there upon and even after management changes processes sometimes just “stay around”. “Thats just the way it is” is the most idiotic thing I often hear in companies.
@@Thesupermachine2000 I am not blaming the employees, sorry if I left that impression! You are right that if someone is trained on a method or sequence that they might often just keep it as standard. However people at the senior or management level have an obligation in my view to examine these systems and find more efficient ways and identify weaknesses. It’s a general complacency that sets in over time where no one, employees or boss, even thinks to wonder why.
@@MichaelEilers I work as a Technician for a very large Ford Dealer. We have alot of "outdated" processes. Whether safety related or whatever. Management is always more occupied with making more money and safety along with other necessary things get overlooked as "we will deal with it later" or "when someone finally gets hurt".
@@Silent_Shadow I used to work for General Motors 🤣🤣
Management in-situ often fails to see any benefit to changing what they perceive to work fine, especially if changing it would require paying someone to fix it. For example, at my job, we are required to look at a computer screen and copy information by hand onto a workorder. It's human-unfriendly data like file names, date strings and other things. It requires multiple passes of look at screen/write it down to get all of it and people sometimes get it wrong or skip it altogether because this process takes too long. Since ALL of this data is already in the computer, I suggested we have the system generate these work orders, prepopulated with all the info and a barcode and all the user would need to do is write their name on it and sign it when done. This eliminates all that copying info by hand, reduce errors, save a ton of time, etc etc. No buy-in from management because they'd need to put a programmer on it instead of a client project. And they feel the existing system is fine because they never use it themselves.
As a long time subscriber, it makes me very happy to see that you easily hit over 100k views a video!
Thank you
Balls, the lack of clear procedures to double-check things are correct is scary. I recently did a railroad camp where we were operating equipment and we double-checked that the route was clear and that we had someone to act as a second set of eyes. And if at any point you were not sure, you stopped to double check! At one point backing a train up, I had to stop during a backing up move since a switch was thrown against me. Without that second set of eyes, things could have been bad.
As I recall, Disney had made all their operating rules into "guidelines" because it was too difficult/time consuming/costly to change the rules. So while it was still a "guideline" to have everything checked, it was no longer required.
Great video as always!
If I may make a suggestion for your scandal series, A video about the British Beef BSE (mad cow disease) outbreak in the 80s and 90s, would be so interesting to hear you explain. I know it's not the kind of subject matter you normally do, but this incident in addition to being unbelievably scary, also had very tragic consequences for many of the millions of people who ate potentially contaminated British beef during that time period.
To this day I cannot give blood in NZ because I was in the UK at the time of the BSE outbreak.
@@pinballrobbie I think in many states in the US blood donation bans like that are also still in place. I'm so sorry you had to experience that personally, what a scary disease to be exposed to.
Good idea
@@SkyeFergus I don't think I'm mad but of course I wouldn't know lol.
I’m from the UK and this incident totally put me off eating beef. It still has. I was young at the time but I got the impression it was a random lottery who caught CJD from infected beef and the results were you’d have irreversible brain deterioration.
I remember seeing footage of an infected cow who had no control of its limbs and could hardly stand up or walk, they were like Bambi on ice.
Wow this actually makes my experience getting on the monorail in September 2009 make so much more sense. The monorail was about to leave and my family and I were one of the last few who barely made it. We noticed there was nobody in the very front which we just chalked it up to being very lucky that maybe nobody knew they could ride up front with the driver. We had no idea about the accident that took place 2 months ago, but maybe would have not taken our chances had we known.
0:40
>I think I've gotten a little sidetracked here.
I mean, I was 100% on board with just listening to a donut discussion for 17 minutes.
😬
Tbh it is cheaper for a company when a passenger dies rather than be injured.
Channels like yours have made me an absolute pain-in-the-ass stickler for process safety procedures.
Disney may be seen by some as a ''magical'' company, but in reality, they are one of the shadiest, most bent, dirty and backhanded corps anywhere in the world. This happening is not surprising in the least. No wonder the daughter of Walt Disney wants nothing to do with them now.
I'm glad you said this. You said it in a (PR friendly) kind of way. I don't know how to do that. I speak short and true. That usually comes out as sharp and rude. But not always. I also tell how good of a job that was. Or just how beautiful that is (I don't even have feelings and I still am so attracted to your work). But, it is assured. That if the system is the spout that feeds you. There is going to be what you said. And a lot worse.
Look at John getting a bit cheeky!! I LIKE it!
I like the change to not using intro music, keeps the video calm
Monorail can be dangerous, but Wuppertail is a magnificent example of good engineering
It is
It's also a one-of-a-kind system that was initially built in 1901. As awesome as it is, it's worth remembering that there's a reason monorails didn't catch on as mass transit across the world - and they've definitely been around long enough to do so if they'd been worth the investment.
It also adds a bit of interesting context to the idea that monorails "look futuristic." They're literally a rather dated piece of technology. It's the same thing with the hyper loop - it's just a recycled idea from the 1860s and one was actually built in London. There's a reason this stuff didn't take off and come to dominate transportation.
“And this is my favorite part of the video” *St. Judes commercial*
The timing was impeccable. As always your video is entertaining and interesting all at once.
"Staffing issue" "Manager set up in a cafe working on his phone" Oh yeah. This was always going to be a disaster. Corporations are always wanting to understaff transportation and it always creates safety problems.
In the US right now, we're in a President ordered 90 day arbitration period between the rail unions and rail companies and it's likely going to result in a rail strike or a lockout (or both) because rail companies want to reduce staffing and not raise wages and the unions are pissed because they've not gotten raises in several years and are extremely concerned about staffing shortages leading to unsafe conditions for both workers and the communities they pass through.
In fairness to the President transportation including rail is so critical you really can't have a strike. If folks won't work under contract they'll have to work at bayonet point.
No it's not even slightly fair but it has to keep running understaffed or not.
As an edit, don't take this as a political comment I can see left or right wing solutions to this issue that might work. There are simply two issues that make it hard to address. A lot of funding would have to be diverted from other more politically popular projects to fix it no matter whose solution you use.
Secondly when it comes to wages and staffing we assume not only that there's a bottomless pit of money but that there's a bottomless pit of people willing to do the job. To a degree the two go hand in hand but as the saying goes it's not always that simple.
@@M167A1 As someone who lives about 10 yards away from one of the busiest rail lines in the country? I'm okay with a strike if it means I don't have to worry about a train derailing in my town (again). There's a train going by right as I'm typing this reply.
Rail freight companies are making record profits. They can afford a pay raise and to hire more ppl. They can also afford to train new hires as well.
I know that rail is critical to our supply lines and infrastructure. I also know that the current situation is untenable. The Department of Transportation should have acted in cooperation with the Army Corp of Engineers back in early 2021 when it became obvious that the backlog of ships off Pacific ports wasn't going to clear up and they should have begun work on new ports to help with the backlog.
This entire situation is a complete failure of the Department of Transportation and our current leaders. But this is a "business-friendly" government - which means they put profits ahead of the people. That's something they've demonstrated over and over again in the past 2 years.
@@M167A1 There was no doubt from anyone involved that the President would appoint a PEB so a strike would not happen at this point. There could be a strike or lockout mid September. If that happens it would only last a hours before congress passed legislation to put the railroads back to work.
The railroads want to effectively give their employees a pay cut while making them work more. There is a lot more to it than just that though.
I didn't hear anything about that?
My dad was a railroad worker and said they won't strike
"I have to control a train line? Alright I'll do it at a fucking coffee shop"
"I was a child, and thus... an idiot."
Saturday mornings wouldn't be the same without your videos.
Wow, thanks!
You're welcome! I saw my first Plainly Difficult video about a year ago. I was instantly addicted. I don't remember which video it was but it was one of the nuclear incidents. Binge watched the whole channel. Lived through TMI and Chernobyl so I've always had an interest in those kind of events.
I grew up in Orlando and I have many good memories of riding in the front of the monorail. To me that, and the parking lot tram, were the best rides.
John- This is my favorite part of one of these videos.
Me immediately gets 2 Ads 😢
I legit thought I was getting trolled.
Sorry
goes to show that even a very controlled closed system like this has edge cases where things fail spectacularly
My family is from that area of Florida, an interesting aside is until air conditioning became accessible and Disneyworld arrived, it was a pretty desolate swampy hellhole primary used for cattle ranching, specifically for Brahmin cows because they thrive in hot climates. It's a part of why Disney bought the land there, it was cheap because it was unwanted by everyone except farmers.
'But I was a child. Thus an idiot' best line ever!
you'd think they'd have a redundant safety system through the power delivery since the monorails are fed power through the tracks thus if in a certain block section it detects a powerdraw that would indicate two monorails drawing power (more power than 1 could use), it would send out warnings if not just outright kill power to the tram to stop them.
Monitoring power draw in each block section would definitely be a fairly simple way to tell if more than 1 train is in a section. If the draw approaches or exceeds roughly double normal, then it should trigger an alert. However, you'd need more separation, if two trains are in the same block its already too late (especially if they are moving in opposite directions). Power draw would still be a good way to tell if there's a train in any one section, as you could follow where each train is based on power draw in each block. You'd just have to keep one or two no power draw blocks between trains.
Simply monitoring for increased power draw won't work, since each train draws widely varying amounts of power - lots when it's accelerating, some when cruising, and little when stopping or stationary.
However the basic idea has merit. I think it could be made to work using power flow sensors spaced relatively frequently along the track. If the power flow into and out of an area are different then the area contains at least one train, otherwise it is empty. Such a system would have been infeasible when the monorail was built, but with modern electronics it can be done.
Another possibility would be upgrading MAPO with a much greater number of trackside nodes and giving them the ability to receive as well as transmit, so that train positions could be shown on a fine-grained map. Again this would have been infeasible when the monorail was built, but today, digital signal processing and networked communications have become much more powerful and much less expensive.
I’ve seen videos about this in the past, but I know yours is gonna be way more informative and watchable.
Thank you!
Watched it and I was right!
Always love your videos. 😻 I like to think you rock back slightly to look out your window to tell the weather there. Cheers 🍻
😬
So, in an OS, there are mutex to avoid this scenario.
The pink train should not be able to reverse without permission from the switcher only. The radio should not be used by other trains while switching; the other trains can brake and wait if they need a decision from dispatch before continuing. The block warning system should warn you regardless of the direction; reversing was necessary for normal operation so there is absolutely no reason for that to have been overlooked.
Nice! Straight up roast of Disney turned into subtle burn at the beginning! 🤣
As someone who did get to ride in the cab of a monorail, John, it was fun but you didn't miss a lot.
Happiest place on earth indeed... Also as a long-time OpenTTD fan/player I absolutely very much appreciate/share the consistent and succinct explanations/affection for signalling dynamics. It's a beautiful thing. When it works as it should that is.
Hey John!
I just wanted to say that this could possibly be your best videos yet! No I'm not exaggerating or talking out my arse, I really do mean it. You seriously nailed this one! Here's my reasons (in a list cuz I'm lazy):
•You explained everything clearly and concisely. (as per usual)
•The video was long enough that nothing felt rushed or overlooked, yet short enough to leave me wanting more. (some voodoo shit if I've ever seen it)
•It was highly engaging. (I almost always only listen to UA-cam videos; ADHD makes it nearly impossible for me to watch them... I watched this one. You riveted my attention without resorting to flashy lights and jump cuts! Bravo!)
•The very best part of this video was the writing. I have a deep appreciation for good words John, and these were good words. Study the intro to this video my friend, cuz those first few minutes were written by a god. 1̶1̶/̶1̶0̶ 12/10.
Thank you I really appreciate it
@@PlainlyDifficult I gotta call it as I see it, this was 😙👌 fine art!
@@ltsgobrando ADHD means I'll never get addicted to binging UA-cam, now that's a superpower. I listen on UA-cam while doing stuff too.
I never knew a theme park monorail could be so confusing
I worked at Disney World in the Monorail Pilot role back in 2013. This was an incident that no one, and I mean no one, was allowed to publicly speak about. We were required to deflect any and all conversation from guests that involved the accident, Austin, Monorail Pink, and Monorail Purple, etc. The only way I really found out the details was when I was smoking a cigarette with a Monorail Pilot who was on-scene on the platform during the accident coordinating the evacuation of guests and trying to see about Austin until EMS arrived. To this day, it troubles him to speak of it, but he wants to let all platform operators who are about to train to become pilots to know exactly what happened and why safety is of the utmost concern in our role.
If you ever wondered why those in the Monorail role can be a bit short sometimes or why they freak out when a guest starts to climb on the gate, it’s for the reason of safety. That rail is electrified to 600 VDC and they will not hesitate for a second to remotely disconnect power at a platform if at any time they feel the safety of guests is in question. They will hold up the train as long as it takes to restore order.
Any questions, please ask away :)
This is really insane, I can imagine that knowing that this happened or even being present during the accident would really take a toll on someone
@@detectivesunshine1760 taking a toll would be an understatement.
@Madame d'Badger well, we could talk about it when out of the earshot of guests, however, it wasn’t a topic that was exactly mentioned ad nauseam after over four years since the accident.
I personally knew Austin (Pilot of Purple) when I was a College Program Intern back in 2007. That was also back when interns could become pilots (which stopped after 2009). He was a really nice guy. No one ever had a bad thing to say about him. When I had heard that a pilot had died and that it was Austin, I grieved for him and his family. After the accident, the slogan of “One Rail, One Family” emerged and became a tie that still binds current and former pilots alike to this day.
How could they ban you from speaking of it? You can leave and complain, it is worth doing when lives of ppm and safety are involved
@@Plaksa2004 ok, simply put, they didn’t want us talking about it while “on-stage” aka on the clock with guests. As cast members, we are/were responsible for the image of Disney. It isn’t very “magical” to discuss the accident. The last thing a kid wants to hear is how the monorail they are about to ride was the cause of death of another person.
Good morning plainly difficult! Thank you for another amazing video! Happy Saturday
Happy Saturday to you
Mr. Difficult,
You could do an entire year's worth of videos just on Disney, and they could cover every different "theme" you have! Human Folly Disasters, Scandals, The Dark Side Of Science, Strange Places, and I'm pretty sure there's a whole MESS of other stuff in there!
Ah, monorail... Takes me back to when I got the Lego Futuron Monorail Transport System for Christmas & Birthday in 1990 or 91 or so. And of course, the Simpsons episode!
Gotta say, this one hit the algorithm pretty hard, great work!
I've heard about it before... BUT for the LIFE of me, it just FEELS like the kind of thing you'd expect to hear about the 90's or earlier...
I kind of wonder what Disney ride actually has the highest body-count per park... if there is such a record... Just a morbid spot of curiosity... I'd lay money, though, just from what I HAVE heard and read up about Disney parks and accidents, that it's something like the monorail, people mover(s) or a similar attraction/ride something... They all move relatively slowly on a sedate and smooth track/system. I'm guessing that's how guests and visitors and probably even staff let themselves get complacent about safety rules because it's so easy to under-estimate the actual hazards.
ANYWAYS... Good retelling and summary/breakdown of the whole incident! Keep up the great job! ;o)
Watched a documentary about this yesterday.
Good timing!
I can just imagine some smartarse from the NTSB turning up, seeing the mess and asking immediately "What kinda mickey mouse operation are you guys running here?!?", and promptly getting his rear kicked off site... :P
I would be me!
You probably think this is all "fun and games".
I only think of the Simpsons when monorails are mentioned. Great video, never heard of this before but there's a lot to do with Disney that they keep buried
I love that one
This wasn't buried. It was all over the news when it originally happened.
🎶 🎵 monorail, monorail, MONORAAAIL! 🎶 🎵 😄 🤣
same!!
i love the fact that the subtitles even say "(Show Doughnuts)" at the beginning, you really didnt need to do that
😬
While on occasion people have died at Disney World, not surprising given the vast crowds, the company long had an agreement with the authorities that the death certificates would show the hospitals where the unfortunate people were taken as the official places of death. Never Disney World itself.
It was impossible to maintain this fiction with the monorail crash, however, as rescuers spent a prolonged time extricating the obviously dead operator from the wreckage. Disney quietly changed its policy.
Talking about the elephant of the Wuppertaler Schwebebahn (hanging monorail of Wiuppertal): There is no outside photograph of the incident at all. This is a montage that was sold as a postcard to tourists. Tuffi from the Circus Althoff was still quite young, and taken into a wagon for a publicity stunt, but the keeper underestimated the fear of height of the poor beast. It broke through the wall, bailed out, and fell into the river below (most of the line is running right above the river Wupper, in order to keep the streets free). Fortunately, the animal only suffered a few bruises.
Apart from this curios case, the line every now and then experienced accidents, mostly caused by human error. Most were minor ones, but on April 1999, after the replacement of a part of the supporting scaffolding, someone had forgotten to remove a maintenance clamp, derailing a car so forcefully that it fell down. This incident took 5 lives. Since then, the line is first checked by an empty car each time similar maintenance work has been done, to make sure this will happen never again.
Trainly Difficult today! Another great outro track too. Going to checkout that music channel. Thanks John!
I remember as a kid sometime in the mid 2000s my father convinced the monorail operator to let us ride in the driver's cab with him while the monorail went down its course. It was quite an experience that'll stick with me for a long time to come. Guess I was lucky enough to catch it before the accident happened.
Fascinating as always. RIP to the driver
I wonder how much training the panel operator had regarding the switch control panel's ability to time out and reset (which strikes me as a pretty dangerous design that was just waiting to contribute to an accident).
Walt's comment from 6 ft under: "Balls!"
Well sir, there's nothing on Earth like a
Genuine
Bone fide
Electrified
Six-car
MONORAIL!
Brilliant channel dude 👌 slowly making my way through your videos each night 👍 interesting indeed good work
I couldn't help thinking of Stephen King's Gunslinger series. "All things serve the beam"
There's an amusement park named 'Phantasialand' near Cologne in Germany, and when our family went there for the first time in the late 70's, 8-year old me was impressed the most by the monorail there, too! 😁 And I was also impressed when going back nearly 25 years later and that monorail was still operating! 😊 And that elefant in your photo had jumped out of the 'Schwebebahn' in Wuppertal into the Wupper river below in 1950; It belonged to a circus, and its owner had put the elefant on that train as a promotional gag - but the elefant didn't like it! Luckily it survived the drop nearly unharmed 😊
My thoughts are the procedures didn't memtion keeping their eyes open either, but when controlling the trains you should be in the control room with your eyes open. Enjoying a late supper. Really enjoying your personality coming thru in your narrative more. I'd hazard to say, we're pretty much all of a same mind and humor around here. Great video as always, thank you
Captive slice of audience indeed. I didn't get a chance to watch yesterday and this being my first chance it's the first thing I'm doing.
I love me some banter at the beginning of videos. Going to Disney 3 times (2x as a kid, 1x as an adult) I realize that it's a magical place, but an incredibley expensive place as well. 😭
You’d need a second mortgage nowadays, a work colleague went there recently it cost them £18k
@@PlainlyDifficult yeah its ridiculous. Just entry to the park for a family is a couple thousand. FOR ONE PARK. wildddd.
@@PlainlyDifficult If I were to spend that much on a trip, I would buy a ticket down to Antartica on a ship. It maybe just me, but Disney has never done much for me, even as a little one 🤷♀️
I used to go wien it was $20 and it still seemed a bit steep. How the hell you rationalize hundreds of dollars is crazy. Thousands? You need to be locked up. Go to an actual place and invest the rest in your family. Blowing over $20k on a straight to dvd value add is insanely wasteful to your future. Literally WTF.
I am going with my fiancé in November. With park tickets, flights, hotel and food factored in it was $2,000. That was less than our other options of a sandals resort type thing, or a cruise.
As one of the first trained drivers on the EPCOT beam I can tell you that there used to be a maintenance man physically on the ground AT the switch any time a switch was moved. Obviously they cut personnel else this would never have happened.
ive started studying animation because of my dissatisfaction with the products and actions of the company. People want to watch traditionally animated content, im going to make cartoons i think are appealing and see if other people like them too.
Best video you've made. I love you plainly diff
Thank you
this honestly makes me think of the Simpsons monorail episode
So it should
I remember this incident, but I forgot anyone had died as a result. Another great video.
This happened 2 weeks after we stayed there
I had actually ridden with the conductor up front during the trip
I remember seeing this on the news
1:25 that one picture unlocked a deep memory/feeling I had as a 4~7 year old
The more I hear about Disney, the more I appreciate my childhood hero... Bugs Bunny!
The front cab was so amazing to ride in, especially at night. Its one of my fondest memories.
Way back in the mid 70's, when I was a small kid, my family went to Disney Florida. We were getting off some ride, I don't remember which, and my mother was the last to disembark. The car was hit by the next car behind, and my mother was knocked to the ground, twisting her ankle very badly. A piece of paper was immediately thrust into her face for her to sign, which she did, being in a bit of a daze. Later I found out it was some sort of waiver that got Disney off the hook.
Maybe it could have been fought, and some compensation received, but my parents didn't think it worth the trouble. It was our last day there anyway before the long drive north again.
Since then, I've been suspicious whenever somebody thrusts a paper in my face with a demand to sign. This has sometimes lead to loud and vigorous discussions. But now, as a 50 something crusty old grey bearded SOB, nobody is surprised by this.
Yeah. I find it funny when they start acting confused and angry when I read the contract before signing it. Walked from some contracts that were clearly sketchy when you broke them down.
@Just Looking Well said.
An immediate waiver, huh?
Every other time I heard this story I was under the impression it was driver error/distraction and the one who was worse off was the FORWARD driving pink driver.
This version (as opposed to the basic quick version on other channels) makes so much more sense as to what sequence of errors needed to happen to result in this trajedy...
John from southern London: "I was a child and thus an idiot".
Children may be watching, John 🤣
They can learn something
Roasting Disney is the pinnacle of entertainment. I did actually pause to get a snack and a drink before watching this one.
We need a Fascinating Horror x Plainly Difficult collab
not a bad idea
This proves that all parks have accidents and incidents....I liked it I want more about the "terror" parks.!!
At 1:05 Dumbo realizes that he really couldn't fly...
😂
Informative, entertaining, educational, and amusing.
Thank you