An Adventureland worker died on the job last year while working on the park’s popular Raging River ride. The worker’s wife has filed a wrongful death lawsuit against an employee of the park “claiming a failure to follow several protocols caused by her husband’s fatal injuries.”
Steve Booher, the 68-year-old part time worker, died on his sixth day of working with Adventureland from “trauma to his skull and brain… [after] he fell from a loading platform onto a conveyor belt carrying the large circular rafts that ferry riders through the popular water ride. The moving belt pulled Booher in between a raft and a concrete sidewall, causing the injuries, according to the lawsuit.”
Booher was assisting guests onto rafts when the ride operator, Stuart Glen, started the conveyor belt without receiving a thumbs up signal. Glen failed to read the ride’s operating instructions despite them being “posted in front of him on the ride’s control board… which is located in a tower above the loading platform, according to the suit.”
In addition to Glen starting the conveyor belt without the thumbs up signal, Glen failed to hit the emergency stop button. Guy Cook, the attorney that is representing Glen, said a major dispute in the suit is if Glen’s actions are to be considered at a level of “wanton and reckless disregard” for a fellow employee’s safety and well-being.
Booher was put on life support after the fall at Mercy Medical Center for the following days until he passed away. The park has paid a fine of $4,500 that was “levied by the Iowa Occupational Safety and Health Administration for failing to create a safe work environment.” The suit is seeking that Glen pays for the damages that “would make up for Booher’s future earning potential, as well as loss of consortium for his wife and their adult children.”
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