Talk:Perilous Plunge

Roller coaster or water ride?

Is there a reason why this article is categorised as a roller coaster. I thought a water ride would be a better description of the ride. If anyone else considers it a water ride it should use Template:Infobox water ride not Template:Infobox roller coaster. Themeparkgc  Talk  07:07, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

Fatal Accident

Removing the section on the fatal accident is coming close to vandalism. Saying it has no reliable source when it is sourced to the LA Times is a bit silly. I'm not saying the section couldn't use improvement. However, both of your arguments for removal, namely undue weight and no reliable source, are ungrounded. Eastshire (talk) 13:50, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

The Los Angeles Times source is indeed reliable, however much of the information in the article attributed to it is not present in said source. According to the Times, the incident occurred, the victim was identified and the cause of death was mentioned. That's it ... no mention of the woman's size, weight, nor any mention of the ride's operational parameters. The second source in this paragraph, from ErgoWeb, is apparently a blog and opinion piece, with no way to verify its information. Even it says it's speculating about what happened. That said, it does mention another AP article; now if someone were to find that, it would back up some of the specifics.

Now onto WP:UNDUE. While any death is indeed tragic, it must be examined in the overall scope of the ride. One death out of millions of rides in 12 years (a single boat's cycle carrying a full load of passengers equals 24 rides) ... that's actually a pretty good safety record, in my book, and thus shouldn't have an entire section devoted to it. My revision left in what occurred and that someone was killed, but removed the improperly cited details. It also indicated that the incident was related to the change in harness configuration that appeared after the incident. It also provided a link to a full description of the incident in the Incidents at Cedar Fair parks article, which is a collection of summaries of incidents involving Knott's Berry Farm, which is owned by Cedar Fair. Thus the information remains available and quite easily found to anyone who wants to find it. This also matches consensus found on other theme-park articles, such as those owned by Six Flags, Disney, SeaWorld Parks and others.

--McDoobAU93 15:07, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

I don't want to get into a revert war here, so let's hash this out. Incidents at Cedar Fair parks is not meant to be a way to hide serious incidents from ride pages. It is meant as a summary page. Of the 19 rides listed on that page that have their own page, 16 of them (not including Perilous Plunge) have a separate section on the incident in their main page. Another two (including Perilous Plunge) mention it inline in another section. The last article fails to mention it or link to the summary page at all. Clearly, the consensus is that serious incidents are not undue weight to articles. I propose we come up with a short paragraph based only on the LA Times article in the style of the main page articles for the other Cedar Fair rides with serious incidents. Eastshire (talk) 13:07, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

Please review the first two sentences of the "Changes" subhead. They show that the change in harness system was a result of the incident, and the incident is linked directly in that paragraph, taking a reader straight to the section itself with full detail. Nothing is being hidden or censored from the article. In fact, we're making the correlation that the incident had a direct result on how the ride operates. --McDoobAU93 15:06, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

I think having it a section called "Changes" buries the important information. I think separating it into a separate section, as I have done and as is typical for ride articles on Wikipedia, is the best solution. I tried to find another source or two on the incident, but there didn't appear to be any other free articles (I found two archived articles that cost around US$4.00 to access. Eastshire (talk) 13:03, 27 July 2012 (UTC)

Again, please read this part of WP:UNDUE (emphasis mine):

An article should not give undue weight to any aspects of the subject but should strive to treat each aspect with a weight appropriate to its significance to the subject. For example, discussion of isolated events, criticisms, or news reports about a subject may be verifiable and NPOV, but still be disproportionate to their overall significance to the article topic. This is a concern especially in relation to recent events that may be in the news. Note that undue weight can be given in several ways, including, but not limited to, depth of detail, quantity of text, prominence of placement, and juxtaposition of statements.

While I know you mean well, just because other articles ultimately have it wrong doesn't mean that this should. Incidents on amusement park rides are ultimately isolated events, since they happen so rarely, which make them relatively insignificant in the presentation of the ride's overall article. Also, creation of a separate section does indeed indicate prominence of placement, since we're breaking it out separately. The previous version (before you revised it) met the standards set by WP:UNDUE; this version, in my opinion, does not.

--McDoobAU93 14:36, 27 July 2012 (UTC)

Unfortunately the WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS here is not having a separate section. The clear consensus of editors is that serious incidents on rides should have their own section. As previously noted that is the case in 16 of 18 rides owned by Cedar Fairs with articles on Wikipedia (not counting this one). We have a standard way of reporting on serious incidents and that standard is to have a separate section in the article. Eastshire (talk) 14:21, 30 July 2012 (UTC)

Yes, let's do look at the standard, based on all theme park articles. So let's include those from Disney, Six Flags, SeaWorld Parks, Herschend Family Entertainment, Parques Reunidos, Merlin and even independent parks. Basically, the Cedar Fair articles have it wrong based on the interpretation of WP:UNDUE that was presented above. I would like to hear why you believe that that interpretation is incorrect. --McDoobAU93 14:38, 30 July 2012 (UTC)

I limited my search before to Cedar Fair parks because I didn't see a need to do more research when the consensus is so clear. However, I have now done a similar survey of Incidents at Disneyland Resorts. There is no strong consensus in these articles as 5 have separate sections and 8 have no mention. I also surveyed Incidents at Six Flags Parks. They have a strong consensus towards separate sections with 15 separate sections, 3 inline mentions, and 7 no mentions. So combining these with Cedar Fair we have 36 separate sections 5 inline mentions and 15 no mentions. At the very least, it is not inappropriate to have a separate section and I submit the consensus is to have a separate section.

I think one of the things readers want to know about a ride is whether it's had an incident. I suspect it is probably the second most reason a reader would look at an article (the first being what the ride experience is). Rather than burying that information the reader is looking for, we should provide it in an easy to find manner. Not doing so, violates NPOV as it makes it appear that we are carrying water for the parks or ride manufacturers. Eastshire (talk) 13:50, 31 July 2012 (UTC)

I'll try again ... earlier, I presented a section of WP:UNDUE with three highlighted points: "isolated events", "overall significance" and "prominence of placement". The first point is the main one ... you're attempting to give too much coverage to a single outlying incident. And consensus appears to be shifting in that regard; as I discover these attraction articles with large incident sections, I (and other editors) have removed them and relocated them (complete with linking) to their respective incidents articles with no mess and no fuss. By WP:CONSENSUS, the acceptance of the change indicates consensus just as much as any discussion does.

Now, with the edit I made, it supported all three points of WP:UNDUE. It treated the incident as an isolated event (yes it happened, but it's not the be-all-and-end-all of the attraction's history), connected to the overall significance to the attraction (it forced a change in harness design) and is not prominently featured in the article. The current edit fails all three: it is treated as a major event (one event counts as "isolated", even if it's backed up by reliable sources, per UNDUE), complete with its own section that's longer than the ride overview (failing "prominence of placement"), artificially inflating its significance.

As to "carrying water", the complete removal of such information would do that. Again, the information is not removed. It is relocated, with linking provided to take the reader directly to the information they apparently are seeking, per your interpretation of a reader's interest in a given attraction. On that: if they wanted to find out of a park attraction has had an incident, they certainly don't need us. Google and Bing are much better at that, as they should be, since they don't care about "prominence of placement", "isolated incidents" or "overall significance". They just care that the search characters requested by the user are found within the item presented in response to the request.

To conclude: Granting out WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS (since there is no 100% consensus in either direction, this argument can be used for either version, thus canceling itself out), why does the current version adhere to WP:UNDUE better than the previous version?

--McDoobAU93 14:49, 31 July 2012 (UTC)

OTHERSTUFFEXISTS, does not in my opinion, cancel out here. Remember, the point of OTHERSTUFFEXISTS is not that we don't take into account what else is on Wikipedia, but that just because something happened at least once elsewhere justifies it happening again in another place. I think I have shown a firm standard for the treatment used in this article.

I think you are abusing the isolated event standard. Following your logic, we wouldn't cover a person's birth, death or marriage in an article as they only happened once and therefore are isolated events and unreportable. That's not a reasonable position. An accident by its very nature only happens once. That doesn't disqualify from inclusion. By placing in a section about how the ride was changed overtime you unduly underweight its importance to the article.

A search engine is just going to send me to Wikipedia. Eastshire (talk) 14:40, 1 August 2012 (UTC)

But again, OTHERSTUFFEXISTS depends on the interpretation of other guidelines/policies. So, based on your interpretation, OTHERSTUFFEXISTS (things that, in your view, are incorrect). Based on my interpretation, OTHERSTUFFEXISTS (things that, in my view, are incorrect). Thus, we're making the same argument from different points of view.

You're confusing "unreportable" and "lack of inclusion" with "prominence". Again, the incident is included, just not as prominently featured. Details are available simply by clicking on the link, which is provided right where the incident is mentioned in the article. This matches WP:UNDUE perfectly in that an isolated event is mentioned, but not given prominence enough to overpower the article ... or, to be fair, be more prominent than it really deserves to be.

To take your analogy (which actually proves my point, inadvertently), let's do look at that. In many biographical articles, a person being born is very simply mentioned. It says "So and so was born on date and month, year in where, there." Did it occur? Yes. Is it included? Of course. Did it take over the article? No. Why? Because while it did occur, it isn't a defining moment in the person's history. In the case of this incident, it occurred and a change was made to the harness structure. That's it.

Lastly, a Google search of "amusement park ride accidents" takes you first to RideAccidents.com, a widely known (but not terribly reliable) source, then to a few videos and current stories and eventually to a Wikipedia article. So even Google agrees, Wikipedia isn't the first source for such things.

--McDoobAU93 16:04, 1 August 2012 (UTC)