‘Class Action Park’: Deadly History of American Theme Park Revealed

Snake-infested waters, an enclosed waterslide, and a fierce wave pool – This theme park in the US was responsible for the deaths of six people in the space of seven years.

The story of Action Park in Vernon, NJ, which most of us have probably never heard of, is truly one of the wildest you’ll ever come across.

A new HBO Class Action Park documentary details all sorts of indiscretions from the park’s heyday, including drunken underage staff running the rides, failed ride designs, and countless deaths and injuries, all while authorities turned a blind eye and the gamblers kept showing up.

Yes, this is a true story.

In 1978, Action Park was opened to the public under the ownership of Great American Recreation.

It quickly became popular with locals and tourists for its crazy and unique attractions, and was considered one of the first modern water parks of its kind in the US.

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But as quickly as it gained popularity, it also gained notoriety for its truly disastrous number of injuries as a result of its dangerous attractions.

An emergency room director at a nearby hospital reported in 1987 that they were treating between five and ten victims a day during peak season. The park even purchased additional ambulances to meet the demand.

Some of the park’s most infamous attractions included the Super Speedboats, which were set up in a small pond and known to park staff for being heavily infested with snakes. And then there were the Bumper Boats that regularly had engines that leaked fuel.

Then, in the mid-1980s, the company built the infamous Cannonball Loop, with a closed round loop at the end, similar to a roller coaster but shaped like a slide.

When the slide was first completed, the organizers used mannequins to test the ride and found that they continued to emerge mutilated. Undeterred, the staff were eventually asked to give the Cannonball Loop a try and were offered $ 100 bills as incentives.

One of the staff members, known as Fergus, described himself as “one of the idiots” who accepted the offer, saying, “$ 100 didn’t buy enough alcohol to drown that memory.”

The test riders were left with bloody mouths and unexplained lacerations, until it was discovered that the teeth of the previous riders had gotten stuck in the loop and were cutting people.

Despite the testing disaster, the slide was open for a month in the summer of 1985 before it was quickly closed by order of the state’s Advisory Board on Carnival Rides Safety.

Named in the documentary as another of the most dangerous attractions in the park, Roaring Rapids produced a long list of injuries.

In a 1984 submission to the state of New Jersey, the park noted a large number of injuries at this attraction, including fractured femurs, clavicles, noses, as well as broken elbows and dislocated shoulders and knees.

Another attraction was Cannonball Falls, which saw cyclists launched from a slide and from a 3m drop before hitting the water. Employees admitted that they constantly pulled people out of the deep, icy mountain pool because they were in shock or hadn’t gotten off the slide properly.

Another attraction, the wave pool, also known as the grave pool, was 30 m wide and 250 m long, and could hold 500 to 1000 people.

The waves were generated for 20 minutes at a time with 10-minute intervals between them and could reach a meter in height.

The pool was said to be too strong and too deep and many revelers were unable to swim, but even those who could swim were sometimes exhausted, causing patrons to crowd onto the side stairs when the waves started, leading to several accidents

Three people died in this pool.

Deaths in the action park

July 8, 1980: Perhaps one of the ugliest and most disturbing incidents in Action Park, the death of George Larsson Jr after riding the Alpine Slide is one of the main focuses of Class Action Park. The Alpine Slide, an 820m-long track made of concrete, fiberglass and asbestos, saw riders sit on small sleds that had a brake / throttle lever and ride down the incline. One afternoon while visiting the park with a friend, Larsson, 19, boarded the Alpine Slide. The brake on his sled was broken, which evidently caused his sled to go off the track. He fell into an embankment and hit his head on a rock, a wound that put him in a coma and killed him. Park founder Gene Mulvihill told reporters that Larsson was an employee, traveling at night, and that it had been raining, a story his family disputes. Mulvihill told this story because if Larsson was an employee, he was not required to report this death to the state. State records show that between 1984 and 1985 alone, there were 14 fractures and 26 head injuries caused by the Alpine Landslide.

July 24, 1982: A 15-year-old boy, George Lopez, drowns in the Tidal Wave Pool.

August 1, 1982: Jeffrey Nathan, 27, was electrocuted while at the Kayak Experience, an attraction that saw 20 kayaks travel 300m of rapids. These rapids, as it turned out, were generated by underwater fans. Nathan reportedly got out of the kayak, a common occurrence for riders on this attraction, and while he was in the water trying to get back into his kayak, one of these underwater fans shorted out and electrocuted him. He suffered cardiac arrest and died shortly after. This incident led to the permanent closure of The Kayak Experience, although the park did not take responsibility for the death and claimed that it only closed it because people would be too intimidated. At first, the park disputed that the electrical current caused his death, saying there were no burns on his body, but the coroner responded that burns generally do not occur in a water-based electrocution. The trip was drained and closed for investigation. Accounts differ in the extent of exposed wiring. The park said it was “just a notch,” while others argued that it was closer to 20 cm. The state Department of Labor found that the fan was properly maintained and installed and cleared the park of irregularities. However, he also said that the current had the potential to cause bodily harm under certain circumstances. The park claimed it had been vindicated, though it never reopened the ride, saying people would be afraid to go afterwards.

1984 (date unknown) – A fatal heart attack suffered by a visitor was unofficially believed to have been caused by the impact of cold water in the pool below the Tarzan swing. The water in the attraction and in that bathing area was between 10 and 16ºC, while other water areas were in the 21 to 27ºC range more typical of swimming pools. The Tarzan Swing and the Cannonball ride in this area were operated by spring water.

August 27, 1984: A 20-year-old from Brooklyn drowned in the Tidal Wave Pool.

July 19, 1987: An 18-year-old man drowns in the Tidal Wave Pool.

After a series of personal injury lawsuits, which earned the park the nickname “Class Action Park,” Great American Recreation filed for bankruptcy and the park was finally closed in 1996.

As for how it managed to stay open for so long, it is alleged that the park’s founder, Gene Mulvihill (who died in 2012 at the age of 78) had ties to the mob, which influenced the amount of power he had in the town of Vernon. .

In early 1998, Intrawest announced the purchase of the Action Park property and after substantial reform, including the remodel of attractions and the removal of attractions deemed unsafe, the water park was reopened as Mountain Creek Waterpark, where it is still operational.