2023 TIME USA, LLC. Date: Today, 02:00:07 AM EDT. But nobody bothered to tell me something was wrong with it., As for the outside engineering firms finding that a raft with three passengers weighing between 400 and 550 pounds could go airborne, Jeff said he thought it relied on outdated information. But prosecutors could tell the jury that Jeff and Schooley knew very well that Verrckt could lead to a catastrophe, yet they continued to push forward. If we mess up, it could be the end. It emerged that the opening of the 17-storey water wide was pushed twice because test rides showed rafts flying from the huge ride. . I remember hearing about the accident on the news and thought that the park was going to shut down. Still, neither Jeff nor his siblings offered any public explanation for what had happened. The park issued a statement Monday saying it was deeply and intensely saddened for the Schwab family and all who were impacted by the tragic accident. The water park closed following the incident and will remain shuttered until Wednesday at the earliest, although the slide will not reopen. By then, developers from around the country who also wanted a Schlitterbahn were regularly approaching the Henry family with proposals. At a height of 168 feet 7 inches (51.38 m), Verrckt became the world's tallest water slide when it opened on July 10, 2014, surpassing Kilimanjaro at Aldeia das guas Park Resort . Jeff surveys his most extreme creation, Verrckt, shortly before it opens in 2014. Or by navigating to the user icon in the top right. There are so many questions remaining about the rides construction. ET A few weeks ago, 10-year-old Caleb Schwab died after riding on a water slide at Schlitterbahn Water Park in Kansas City, Kansas. He asked the Henrys to build a Schlitterbahn water park in Wyandotte County, Kansas, which covers the western half of metro Kansas City. After high school, Jeff opened a video arcade bar in San Marcos that he called the Too Bitter Bar, the walls of which contained painted murals of moons, watermelons, lips, and bananas. (After he had created the 135-foot Insano, a Brazilian company built a body slide that was just under 164 feet.) And in Kansas City, even those who cared little for water or who couldnt afford Schlitterbahns $45 admission ($35 for children) would drive by the park just to get a look at Verrckt. Im not quite sure yet, he replied. Despite all his success, Jeff remained, at heart, a river rat. "I looked over and saw his broken neck and him sliding down the slide leaving a blood trail," a witness aid.. It lifted off the chute and went airborne, landing several yards away. Even those werent enough to save 10-year-old Caleb Schwab, who was decapitated. At the Disney California Adventure Food and Wine Festival, you will find a palate-dazzling smorgasbord of cuisines and cocktails in which to indulge. Ten-year-old Caleb Schwab was decapitated while riding what has been dubbed the worlds tallest water slide at the Schlitterbahn Water Park in Kansas City, police said. You read it quietly and are reminded again that Caleb Schwab should still be here. This is the best life I could ever imagine., Jeff was so busy with his own projects that he barely had time to go to New Braunfels High School, and when he did, he often showed up for class barefoot. In five of the incidents, riders claimed they were injured while their rafts were still in the chute. Heendured another jolt of bad publicity when the news media learned about his marijuana use. (WFLA) The theme park with one of the most gruesome accidents in U.S. History is once again open for business. At the top of the platform, they were weighed again and placed in a raft. Schlitterbahn was perhaps not the scene of a freak horrific accident, the prosecutors were saying, but the scene of a crime. of what decapitated the poor child, the blood pooling at the bottom and where his brother stood. It was faked. The Kanas . Then, on August 7, 2016, Caleb Schwab and his family arrived at the park. Caleb Schwab, 10, Decapitated in Water Slide Accident, Police Confirm After a 10-Year-Old's Waterslide Decapitation, Why Were the Ride Designers Charged with Murder? He sketched out his plan for Verrckt: a one-of-a-kind slide that would not only send riders almost straight down a staggeringly tall hill but also shoot them up and over a second imposing hill, giving people multiple heart-stopping thrills. So he invented what he described as a water brake, a dip at the end of the slide that slowed the guests down. Caleb's family received nearly $20 million . Over the next several days, more Schlitterbahn employees rode Verrckt without problems, and on July 10, after thirty months of work, the slide opened to the public. alized the time had come to do it, he told me later. Once again, Jeff and his siblings had no public comment, though Prosapio released another statement that said that Schlitterbahn was shocked by the indictments. 2 What happened to Caleb Schwab is a tragic and heartbreaking story. Caleb Thomas Schwab, Kansas Politician's Son, Dies On World's Tallest Water Slide. I don't even hardly remember driving home.". (Bob died in October 2016, after a long illness, and Billye died in her sleep last year.) The gate swung open, and the conveyor belt underneath the raft began to move. Today, August 7, is the fifth anniversary of his horrific death in August 2016. He posted a $500,000 bond and surrendered his passport. Waiting for Caleb at the bottom of Verrckt was one of his brothers, along with numerous spectators. Today is the fifth anniversary of the traumatic death. And now, the Verrckt water slide at the Schlitterbahn Water Park in Kansas City, Kansas, is the site of a horrible accident, in which 10-year-old Caleb Schwab died Sunday. People got in line to ride Verrckt. Some experts believe that his death was because of the uneven distribution of weight. But watch as the video stops at the end, before the duo goes airborne. . Caleb Schwab autopsy report was being searched by several people as they wanted to know the cause of the 10-year-old boy's death. In a black notebook, he constantly wrote down ideas for new rides he wanted to build. As the boys small corpse slid toward the runout pool, everyone began to scream. Magazines, Digital If the total weight of the three riders was between 400 and 550 pounds, they were sent up the stairs. All Rights Reserved. 1998 - 2023 Nexstar Media Inc. | All Rights Reserved. He seemed close to tears. If you see a couple of people [go down the slide], you say its survivable, Schooley later told a reporter. And he was sometimes as obstinate with coworkers as he used to be with his high school teachers. I cant begin to describe it.. As he told Legends author OBrien, he relied on trial and error, because no models of what was supposed to be done existed at the time. Sometimes hed change his mind about a ride as he was building it and redesign it on the spot. (Even an astronaut couldnt handle it, Jeff later told me. Three riders inside a rubber raft would plummet down a nearly vertical seventeen-story drop at speeds reaching up to 68 miles per hour. [Schlitterbahn managers] would ask lifeguards who would want to volunteer, and no one would put their hands up . In 1998 the New Braunfels Schlitterbahn was named the countrys Best Waterpark in a poll conducted by, In October 2012, Jeff was at an amusement park industry trade show with his chief collaborator, John Schooley, a soft-spoken, silver-haired former yacht builder who had constructed slides at water parks in Asia before coming to New Braunfels to work for Jeff in 1998. To slow the rafts velocity, Jeff and Schooley lessened the angle at the bottom of the initial drop. An investigator spoke to a seventeen-year-old lifeguard who said that Miles had ordered him to write a report that downplayed the severity of the Groves incident. Get email updates with the day's biggest stories. He said that if he was demanding and impatient, it was because he was consumed with making Schlitterbahn the best water park in the world. Thank you for bringing me here, he once said to his dad. I want to have the biggest, the tallest, and the fastest rides at my parks., Like his father, Gary, the eldest child, had a sharp, analytical mind. The case is being investigated as a civil rather than criminal matter, yet details are vague and authorities have disclosed little information about what caused the tragic accident. The deal was announced in 2005, but because of a drawn-out construction process, as well as the economic downturn of 2008, the venture had to be scaled back significantly, with no hotels, no homes, and little retail. However, after a redesign and more tests, Henry said the ride, although still dangerous, was safe: its a safe dangerous now.. In subsequent seasons, he built the Cliffhanger Tube Chute, the Tunnel Tube Chute, and the 45-minute-long Raging River Tube Chute. But there is nothing in the law that requires the inspector to have any particular certifications. At Calebs funeral at the LifeMission Church in Olathe, five days after his death, the grief among the mourners was overwhelming. It was a Sunday afternoon, August 7, 2016, the temperature a pleasant 78 degrees, as ten-year-old Caleb Schwab began the 264-step climb to the top of Verrckt, the worlds tallest waterslide, which loomed like a colossus over the forty-acre Schlitterbahn Waterpark in Kansas City. Around this time he noticed that some of the people going down his fathers slides were hitting the water too hard. You know the [raft] that went airborne on our ninety-footmodel in New Braunfels? What are those large pyramids next to the Skyway? When Jeff and Schooley erected Verrckt, the state charged, they had knowingly created a deadly weapon. Instead of using fundamental mathematical and physics calculations to design and build the ride, the two men had rushed forward relying almost entirely on crude trial-and-error methods. And although they realized that their finished product guaranteed that rafts would occasionally go airborne in a manner that could severely injure or kill the occupants, they went ahead and opened the ride anyway. Verrckt ( German meaning "crazy" or "insane", listen) was a water slide located at the Schlitterbahn Kansas City water park in Kansas City, Kansas, United States. He also kept working for his father. In 2016, An accident that could have been prevented happened in Schlitterbahn which caused the death of a 10-year-old boy; Caleb Schwab Sunday, the son of Scott Schwab, Kansas Representative. Aug 23, 2016 AP Three weeks after Caleb Schwab, the 10-year-old son of a Kansas lawmaker, was decapitated while riding Verrckt, the world's tallest waterslide, experts are still trying to. 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