BY MEGHAN BIGG

For young people days out at theme parks can be great joy but in the case of the Alton Towers crash that happened in June last year, it highlights how potentially dangerous these attractions can be.

Just this week, this tragic event was broadcast again in the news as the Alton Towers operator Merlin Attractionswas fined £5 million after admitting health and safety breaches over the Smiler roller coaster crash.

Two teenagers – Vicky Balch, then 19 when she went on the ride and Leah Washington, 17, each lost a leg in the collision which “changed the lives of some of those injured in the most dramatic way,” according to a judge.

Stafford Crown Court heard that the victims had watched with ‘disbelief and horror’ before ploughing into an empty carriage on the track, with the impact likened by the by the prosecution to a 90 mph car crash.

The operator Merlin was fined after the court heard through an expert witness report, compiled by consultant Stephen Flanagan, which also said that Alton Towers management linked bonuses to ‘’acceptably low levels of downtime’ on their rollercoasters.

Judge Michael Chambers apparently called the accident a ‘catastrophic failure’ by the company involving basic health and safety measures.

He added that it was a “needless and avoidable accident in with those injured were fortunate not to have been killed or bled to death.”

This crash, particularly to a young person, is harrowing to hear about as most of the victims were young and now have been damaged for life due to loss of limbs from the ride.

Hopefully, the resurgence of this story and, due to the company being fined, it can prevent tragic events like this happening again.