The Dreamworld River Rapids Disaster | A Short Documentary | Fascinating Horror 

The conveyor belts at the checkouts in my local supermarket stop automatically if they become obstructed. There is literally better protection in place for my eggs.

What's really depressing is the 12-year-old girl blames herself for her mother's death after she had begged to go on the River Rapids. She is not only dealing with the trauma of what happened, but survivor's guilt, and I really just want to hug her.

When witnesses need counseling, you know it's bad. When paramedics need counseling, you know it's fucking horrific.

Have been on that ride so many times. Dreamworld initially tried to blame a young girl ride operator, she was never shown how or when to use the emergency shut down. My cousin worked there as a ride operator and I'm blown away by his stories.

I have a shirt from my trip to Dreamworld from 20 years ago that says "I survived Thunder River Rapids" It's quite sad and ironic now.

the phrase “improvements to safety were put off due to budget concerns” is never a phrase that should be said. this incident shows such a chilling disregard for safety.

"Immediately plead guilty" Good of them. "Wanted to build a memorial garden" At least they are making up for their mistake "Has yet to fiscally compensate the families" what

I remember when this happened. That’s when I learned the technical phrase “incompatible with life”. Usually, paramedics do not pronounce a patient dead because it’s more difficult to verify such things out in the wild and there’s always a chance that a patient may be resuscitated at the hospital. However.. some injuries are so severe that there is no chance in the world that the victim survived. Hence, paramedics will declare someone to have suffered wounds that are “incompatible with life”.

THE FACT THAT NOT EVEN THE STAFF KNEW WHERE A STOP BUTTON WAS IS INSANE

The worst part of this is the family were about to leave, but the kids convinced them to go on "one last ride". That was the ride that killed their mother and uncle. Can you imaging living with that for the rest of your life? It breaks my heart.

Australian here. From memory, Dreamworld was closed for more than a month afterwards. What you didn't mention is that the children who survived had to watch their mother and uncle drown. That's something you would never, _ever_ get over.

I think one of the most horrifying parts of this tragedy is that, reportedly, the family of the surviving girl had been planning to leave the park, but she asked for just one more ride. Her father stood outside the ride with their infant and he SAW that raft tip the mother of his children into the machinery, with his daughter clinging onto the seat for dear life. Absolutely horrifying. He went missing in 2021, and it's been assumed that he took his own life because of the trauma of witnessing the accident, as well as the stress of fighting Ardent for rightful compensation.

Four years later and they haven’t paid up? Disgusting. The victim’s families may have to haul them back to court for non-payment.

Those two kids who lived are scarred for life for sure. You're not gonna see four people die like that and walk out the same person.

The thing that really gets me with this story. Is the fact that the only survivors, were children of the victims. How horrific and traumatic must it be to lose your parents in an accident you survived. I feel sorry for those 2 children and the negligence on that ride is truly horrible.

The worst part about this story is last year the 12-year-olds father (husband of Kate goodchild) went missing and likely committed suicide because of what happened. Cannot even imagine what she’s going through losing her father after her mom and uncles..

I will never forget the day this story broke. It was massive here in Australia. We thought it was just a horrific accident but the systemic failures were unbelievable and the accident could have been avoided. So weird to know that I went on that ride- it was actually my favorite ride in the park. RIP to those that passed away in the accident

It’s chilling how most of these similar incidents could be prevented if the person in charge actually do their job and not be greedy.

The paramedics on scene described some of the victims as having "injuries incompatible with life", and social media users jumped on him for using a phrase like that. Not only is it a medical term, it's probably the nicest way they could have put the extent of injuries of the victims. Disgusting how social media will jump on anyone in the case of a disaster, even those that tried to help.

It recently became public that the husband of Kate Goodchild and father of the surviving 12 year old girl went missing in July 2021. His car was found at a river crossing outside of Canberra and it is believed he committed suicide by jumping into the river. A search was mounted but called off after nine days. There has been no update since.

As an Australian, I should mention something about this ride - it was the most 'mild' of the rides in the park. The only stuff more gentle was the Wiggle's Big Red Car ride. It was the sort of ride you would go on if you had people who were too young/elderly/frail to go on any of the other rides. Part of what was so shocking was that this ride was so gentle, so babyish, that if you asked someone to guess which ride had an accident, nobody would've guessed that it was the River Rapids Ride. And if you asked them to guess how it happened, they would've said that somebody got out of their seat during the ride or something. Nobody would've guessed that it happened on that ride, the way that it did.

This story sounds like it should have happened in the 70s or 80s. Its terrifying to know it only happened four years ago. While many lessons have been learned, just the thought of how those died is spine chilling. Another well put together and respectful account video.

The bodies would have been torn apart, mangled around the gears and such, no wonder the first respondents required counselling after this, one of them even got PTSD and became a recluse

The Thunder River ride at Six Flags over Georgia in the US malfunctioned when it first opened, too. My best friends brother was one of the park staff working the ride that day. One raft flipped over and the guests were trapped underwater, upside down. He and several other staff dove in and manually released the safety belts, saving the life of every rider. Such a scary day.

Imagine being one of the kids who had to watch their mom die in a brutal fashion right before your eyes on what was supposed to be a special day together. All because some greedy CEO wanted to save money by not investing in safety measures. They should be put in jail.

Oh this was so horrifying when it happened. I live in Queensland and have ridden the River Rapids ride as a kid, as I am sure many SEQlders have. The fact that they tried to blame the 15 year old girl operating the ride when she hadn't been trained properly was disgusting and appalling. It was a failure in Dreamworld's internal safety systems that allowed this to happen. It was the fault of no one else but the corporation that owns the Theme Park. I feel so sorry for the poor families and especially the children who witnessed their relatives horrendous deaths. Dreamworld was closed for quite a while afterwards and people were not keen on going back initially. I don't know what attendance is like these days. I haven't been there for years.

The second he mentioned the giant mechanical conveyor I immediately thought "I know where this is going..."

My brother inlaw needed counciling for years after a similar incident. He was a first responder to a factory accident, but he knew the victim who got dragged into the machinery. I can't even imagine what sort of horror that's like.

"the conveyor belt at this time was still moving." That was enough for me.

You know the reality of this is that 4 human beings were thrown alive into a meat grinder while their children heard and saw their grizzly deaths and the perpetrators have YET to start paying them compensation. Jezus.

I was at Dreamworld on holiday the day before this happened. I took my whole family on that ride. Hearing what happened just 24hrs later still sends chills down my back. Never could you imagine such a thing could happen. Those poor people, the absolutely gruesome and painful way to die.

I appreciate that you don't use dramatic music and see it as a respectful way to convey the story of this awful tragedy.

"Improvements to safety features were deferred because of budgetary concerns." If you operate a massively popular amusement park, you NEED proper safety equipment, even if you don't have enough money. ZERO excuses.

And to think: Those four people would probably still be alive today if the park had just followed basic safety procedures.

When my family and I went to Dreamworld some time before the fatal accident, I noticed that the water level at the top of the conveyor belt was extremely low. Our boat bumped hard into the boat in front and slightly lifted. I believe that Dreamworld were aware of this issue with the pumps way before the accident but chose to ignore it. It was completely preventable.

Honestly I wonder if there was even a single engineer involved in ride safety AT ALL. As you mentioned, there are dozens of very cheap common sensors that would have prevented this: jam sensors on the belt, water level sensors, auto shuttoffs if a pump fails, obstruction sensors to tell if a boat is in the way... seriously, these are common every-day sensors. any engineer would have implemented these

I feel so bad for anyone who worked this ride on that day. Probably some teenager who never would expect that. Plus the children of the family. So sad.

The conveyer belt should never have been that dangerous to begin with. It should be a flat solid surface. Why would you build a body mangler under a freely moving open raft?

"It was custom built by the park" Oh *good* that bodes well...

Minor things to note; Dreamworld wanted to open the park the *day after*. The Queensland Police Service reminded them that it was an active crime scene, and opening the park would have made their lives a lot more difficult

I've been doing some research on this case, after seeing some people on another short video about this event say that this ride had functioned without incident for thirty years. And, well....it didn't. There hadn't been a safety assessment done by a qualified engineer since it opened in 1986, and many ad hoc modifications were never passed on to the regulator. One such modifications was a removal of some wooden slats on a conveyor belt at the end of the ride, which created dangerously large gaps under which was machinery. sound familiar?? "The coroner said managers at dreamworld had ignored pervious incidents where there had been problems on the ride and not done anything to fix underlying causes. There had been serious incidents where rafts had also flipped in 2001, 2004, 2005, 2008, and 2014, but no action was taken to fix the fundamental problem." A safety manager even said it was only a matter of time before a fatal accident happened. There were individuals from the board down issuing safety concerns and no one listened. It's just sickening really. They should have lost every dime and that whole place should have been shut down. The park owners claimed they would be bulldozing the ride and replacing it with a memorial that the family would help design. And instead? They announced in late 2018 that they were building a rollercoaster that would tie into another ride right next to it. And no mention of a "memorial" has been made since. Lastly, there hasn't been much talk of how horrendous the deaths of these four people were, but the coroner said that there were external and internal injuries, meaning the ride dug deeply into their flesh. Other comments I've seen said that because of the slats being removed, the people fell through the gaps, and were pulled into or on top of the machines, which acted like a mincer. It took so long to remove their bodies because of how hard it was to pull their bodies back out of the machinery. They were so badly disfigured that the emt’s and other people who took part in the body retrieval, had to have therapy to deal with the trauma. And no jail time? Only charged 3 million?? No memorial??? Utterly reprehensible. They literally got away with murder. www.afr.com/companies/tourism/dreamworld-tragedy-an-accident-waiting-to-happen-20200225-p5441k

I remember being there only 1 year before this accident. My partner and our daughter and her special needs sister were on the ride and one of the rafts got stuck on the same part, forcing our raft to push up and almost flipped several times til I yelled out to them to fix it. A staff member then used a pole to push the stuck raft. It saddens me that it was a KNOWN issue and was obviously ignored. So sad.

"The recovery of the bodies was so traumatic that even some of the paramedics needed counseling afterwards." What a horrible and preventable tragedy. Those children that survived are going to carry that trauma with them.

I love these types of rides cause I always felt like they were the safest. It's so gentle and calm, who could ever expect this kind of accident? This is terrifying.

"I'm scared to ride the roller coaster." "That's ok, let's try the river ride."

"The victims sustained injuries that were incompatible with life." I'll never forget that quote from one of the responders when this happened. Such a gruesome understatement.

As an Aussie, going on this ride was part of my childhood, as it was for many tens of thousands of other Australians. It was so surreal when this happened.

We rode this ride when I was 11. It had flaws in the late nineties. We had to reach out and push the raft in front of us, up onto the conveyor belt. We bumped into the raft in front of us. Instinctively I reached out and started pushing it. Two adults on our raft took over and managed to get the raft going and up onto the belt. We we’re lucky and our lives we’re spared. I remember at the time, feeling scared and a strong, strange feeling washed over me. My older sister wanted to ride it again. I didn’t want to. Mum and dad said no, let’s ride something else. I have always felt awful for the families and the lives lost. May they Rest In Peace! We let the operators know at the end of the ride. They said, the ride was super safe. I said, could we have tipped over, they replied with a laugh and no. At 11, I knew there wasn’t something right with that ride

As an Australian, I was hoping you would do this one. Dreamworld’s conduct towards its employees and its cold hearted attitude towards the victims families and survivors was atrocious. They blamed employees and fought closing down the park. It’s all about money and I doubt they have learnt anything.

These really aren't the cheesy things you'd expect. They're just well done pieces of history.

For the first 16 years of my life, I visited Dreamworld annually. This was the ride we went on last every single time. It was my favourite way to end the day. When the news broke of this tragedy I was heartbroken. I had been on this ride a few months prior. I can’t imagine the pain and heartbreak the families experienced. It’s truly disgusting that Dreamworld used no basic safety measures on such an important ride.

I worked at a park with a similar ride. The loading area (up high) was separate from the unloading area (down below) guests were never allowed to ride up the conveyor belt. We had CCTV and monitors to view all areas of the ride. Emergency stop switches were clearly marked. Ride operators were certified and had on going training. The ride was operated through 3 test cycles with no passengers, before the park opened. No excuse for what happened.

“Out of respect to the dead and to allow an investigation” I get the feeling the closure had a lot more to do with the latter than the former.

Was really sad and shocking when this happened. It affected all of us in Australia. You explained what happened very well 🙏🏻

I live in Queensland Australia, I had been on this ride probably at least a hundred times in my life. What's crazy is this was considered one of the safest and most family-friendly in the entire park. Most other rides in the theme park were considered a lot more dangerous but due to this fact, they probably had better precautions in case of an emergency.

From the perspective of a maintenance technician, here are three solutions that would have completely prevented this absolute travesty from happening. 1.A simple trip switch at the end of the conveyor that hit the bottom of the boats and stopped the conveyor if it didn’t detect a boat after a set amount of time. 2. An interlock system which prevented the conveyor from starting unless both pumps were detected to be active first. 3. The most rudimentary. A $15 float switch that would kill the conveyor if the water dropped below a set point. As someone who works in the industry, this horror was absolutely on the maintenance department. I would have red tagged not allowed guests on it at all until this was addressed, the big wigs bitching about lost profits be damned.

Usually I hear these terrifying tragedies in the 70s and 80s, knowing how recent this is just gives me chills. And it happened of ignorance. It’s so upsetting and chilling

I'm glad the children survived. But what a shame the park had money to make all the necessary upgrades to open it a year after the accident. And money to start the memorial garden. But not enough to help the families? The two surviving children in the LEAST need counseling.

i think the reason this hit australia so hard is because everyone had been on that ride. the sunny coast is a big place for tourism and at dream world, the river rapids ride is considered to be the ‘safe ride’. i’d been on that ride multiple times as a child and its one of the few rides at the park which parents feel safe letting their children on.

Thank you for reporting this incident without sensationalising it. Many RU-vid channels would neglect to mention that theme park rides are normally extremely safe, so thank you for putting that bit in. It is because of how safe the industry is that when an accident occurs, all efforts must be taken to ensure it can never happen again.

When I heard that they custom-designed the ride themselves all the warning bells started ringing.

The way those 4 people is enough to give me nightmares. I can’t begin to imagine what it was like to witness the accident and to recover the dead bodies.

I live near Dreamworld and have ridden this ride more times to count over the many years I've gone to Dreamworld. This accident was horrific. I will and have never gone back out of respect for the victims.

I really appreciate how you make clear that as long as basic safety procedures are followed, these rides are perfectly safe. A lot of channels that cover topics like this seem like they're trying to make all rides look dangerous just to scare people, and that isn't remotely accurate. So props to you for being responsible.

If the PARAMEDICS needed counseling, then I can only imagine just how badly mangled the bodies were. Dear lord....😧 Those poor kids, having to live with such a damning memory.😞

This 10 minute video did more for my understanding of what actually happened than 4 years worth of news coverage

As an Australian, I remember hearing about this on the news and being sickened by the goriness of the deaths and feeling deeply sickened for days following. This incident has made me think twice about going on any theme park ride at all ever again, because we just can't know for sure that safety procedures are being followed.

So to correct a few points in this video: - According to most reports the children were thrown clear of the ride, onto the catwalk or station platform at the side - Two people were thrown onto the conveyor, one of them a male who was trapped underwater - Two people were trapped on the raft and sustained injuries from the conveyor - The pump had failed and was reset twice that day instead of being properly inspected and repaired because the electrician was busy with other jobs at the park - The junior operator was on her first day and received only 90 minutes of training. She was told about the e-stop which would have stopped the conveyor within 2 seconds "don't worry about that button, no one uses it". The senior operator was unaware of the 2nd e-stop button in the control room.

I live near this park. It's just heartbreaking. They used to be so popular, but now you drive past to see all of the big rides stopped, and you just get this sense of sadness and loss

my friend was one of the first responders on-site as she worked there. she wasn't okay for months after. I'll never forget the look in her eyes. we all grew up on this ride as it's one of the tamer ones. absolutely tragic

I've always had this fear, especially when I was a kid, that I'd be riding on an escalator and it would suddenly fall through and I would get caught in and ground up in the gears. I don't know where I got the idea from but this has actually happened, sadly. This story is like a bigger version of that, and it really creeped me out. It's horrific how those people died, and it doesn't sound like it was particularly fast either. And the poor kids who survived but lost their family members....jeez.

While I’m sure I wasn’t the only one to do so, I recommended this incident because I had yet to find a good video explaining what happened. I knew you would do an amazing job and am so not disappointed. Amazing story telling as ways 👍👍

I’m a local and every time I drive past I can see it’s never been as busy as it was before that day. The car park is never full anymore, not even close.

These poor people. I've always been a scardy cat when it comes to rides, and as a kid this here is the single ride my parents convinced me to go on during our trip to the gold coast. When I saw it on the news the irony of it being the only ride my childhood self deemed safe in 4 theme parks hit hard

One of the true horrors was for the daughter who did not go on the ride. She was standing on a bridge overhead and witnessed the gruesome death of her family. I remember that day, the news reported that the victims "sustained injuries that are totally incompatible with life", which was pretty horrifying just imagining what had happened to them.

This is THE theme park in Australia. Other states don’t really have big parks so we tend to travel to the Gold Coast where dreamworld is (along with water parks etc) for this kind of thing. There’s a lot of trust that dreamworld wouldn’t screw up like this. It’s a trusted name. Or was..

I'm trying very hard to not imagine what it was like when it takes one day to retrieve the bodies and then some of the paramedics needed counseling.

After watching a bunch of your videos and videos by dark history, I have come to the conclusion that human beings don’t really change things until someone dies.

I remember driving past Dreamworld a few weeks after this happened. It was dimly lit, and you could see the mountains of flowers from the highway. It was a haunting image.

Imagine the poor ride operator. A 19 year old girl. Who hasnt been shown where the stop button is. And just having to call and wait for help whilst the meat mincing is happening.

two victims fell from their seats while the other two were actually trapped in their seats under the gears and axel of the ride. one of them floated out because he was not wearing his seatbelt, but the woman next to him was wearing her seatbelt and was stuck in the machine. the kids only survived because they were light enough to keep the velcro seatbelt intact. it was also found that one adult may have been saved had the seatbelt been a lap buckle rather than the velcro.

The worst part of this incident is that the survivors are children who watched their parents and siblings die very traumatic deaths. This by itself is horrible! I cannot imagine growing up having seen that. Its hard enough if your an adult. Those two kids… i hope they each have loved ones that have helped them through this.

I just realized that I started coming to this channel to take a break from the current social and political landscape. Im not sure what that says that I find all of these stories less depressing.

Just grateful that the children were able to survive, this freak accident is tragic to say the least.

Damn, I remember this being on the news here. They never said the park guests were crushed by a conveyor belt. Just that they had drowned. I guess that part was too morbid for local news to want to broadcast.

That memorial garden actually turned out to be a new roller coaster. No memorial ever built and they still have not payed the settlement. Was all PR BS from them until the story died down

Please do the 1973 Isle of Man Summerland disaster Mr Horror. Long forgotten, many lives lost. Would make a fascinating addition to your superb video inventory.

I remember when this happened. The way some of the blankets are positioned in the aerial shot tells you all you really need to know about how horrific the accident must have been. The children are going to live with this memory forever, absolutely tragic.

I remember this day. Australia actually stood still for what seemed like a week. Everyone was just in utter shock. It seemed like everything went slower. It was so horrible to imagine, and it’s still hard to think about. I can’t imagine what the families and friends of the victims must be going through still. Just a terrible tragedy

I am Australian and I remember this. I remember the Ambulance services describing the injuries as "injuries not compatible with life" and people complained. They thought the thermology was cold. It just a easier and professional way to describe extreme trauma resulting in death. If you do not know what it means well lets say we use the term in the railways when a person has gone under a speeding train. Instead of saying the person is in multiple bits you just say "injuries not compatible with life". That sounds better over the radio then saying "there bits of head over there, the some toros there and a leg is there. I am not sure what that bit is"

I was at the park that day, and this ride happened to be my favourite ride. I hadn’t been on it yet that day, but I was planning to. was babysitting my younger brother at the time of the accident, while my parents were on another ride. I haven’t been back to a theme park since.

This was so shocking when it happened. I was in the US at the time working at Disney and I remember the day after this happened every single water ride on property was closed and drained for maintenance... I don't know if it was a coincidence but it definitely spooked me.

Nothing makes me more furious than needless death. This was preventable. I- just can't fathom being so careless and greedy. You cannot justify this park's blatant disregard for human life. Innocent human life.

I am the boyfriend of a family member of the victims, it's been incredibly difficult for the family and there's been a few other unrelated deaths that have compounded the legal issues because it means disputed claims to life insurance and belongings

This place was one of my most fond memories when I visited Australia as a child. I remember riding this ride and have so many photos, it is really chilling to think that the same ride I sat on and loved back then to would bring about so much tragedy and pain in the years to come. Its like being classmates with a serial killer and seeing him on tv years later

This has got to be the most horrifying accident in theme park history, Seriously terrifying.

Nobody should have to die in such a painful, brutal, and horrific fashion. I cant even imagine what these people went thru in their final moments or minutes.

When I heard that two kids survived I slapped my hand over my mouth so hard, they saw their family members die a horrific death and heard their screams, I am going to cry.

I went on this ride in 2010 with my children and I remember feeling really unsafe on it. It was just such a clunky ride. I thought then that there was something wrong with it. When this accident happened it gave me the chills because of my own memories from it in 2010 and sadly, it didn't surprise me.

I just want to say, God bless all emergency personnel out there. The things you guys do is absolutely outstanding and often unbelievable. I once had the endeavor to become an EMT before I developed chronic pain and it was no longer a feasible option for me. But I've seen what it takes -- the long hours and hard work involved, the danger from reckless and mistaken druggies and criminals, the sights you see that you can never forget, the environments you have to enter, all of those extreme factors that would drive the layman to depression, insanity, or worse. Emergency services of all kind carry a valor unlike other professions but especially those who put their lives on the line for mediocre wages specifically to heal and treat others. My hat is off to you lads and lasses, and my utmost respect and love is reserved for you. I hope you know that you are not unappreciated.