Pat McAfee, the popular and sometimes controversial ESPN host, spent nearly 20 minutes of his June 30, 2024 show talking Kennywood and its rides. The show was commenting on a tweet by a local news channel showing The Racer roller coaster apparently being held up by a cinder block. It was obvious Pat loved the park and talked about his childhood visits there that devolved into watching a POV of the ride and reviewing the park in general. The viral story started with a Facebook post by oneBURGH and resulted with the park briefly shutting down the ride, a state inspection and some non-structural repairs.

Kennywood actually shut The Racer down for a brief period of time because of the controversy. The ride was quickly inspected by the state, deemed safe and the park made what thy termed a “non-structural enhancement”. In addition to the comments below, the state inspector called the structure situation “sloppy”, but said the public was never at risk.

The Department of Agriculture said it heard the concerns and sent an inspector to the park earlier this week, saying that they found the support in question was not a primary structural support, but a back-up support. Because of that, inspectors deemed that the ride was safe for operation and recommended only minor, non-structural modifications.

https://www.cbsnews.com/pittsburgh/news/kennywoods-racer-reopening-today-after-one-day-closure-stemming-from-viral-photo-of-concrete-blocks-holding-up-coaster/

Seeing shims of wood and bricks under ride supports is really nothing new for regular observant theme park goers. I remember first seeing them at Fun Spot Kissimmee under Galaxy Spin a couple years ago and then noticing them everywhere after. In some ways it makes sense in that many of these rides travel with carnivals and fairs where they sit on dirt or concrete with no deep supports. Even parts of my back deck aren’t supported by footers and instead safely use special cinder blocks.

I also corresponded with the awesome Ryan the Ride Mechanic for his thoughts and he said it wasn’t abnormal or unsafe at all to see such things under secondary supports. He mentioned that the deck support style blocks are actually pretty common on wooden roller coasters where wood can bend and shrink over time.

Sometimes in public relations perception is reality. A brick under a roller coaster can look a little “sus” (as the kids would say) to the general public even if there is nothing unsafe about it. The recent coverage of the Racer at Kennywood (with Pat McAfee taking what probably would have stayed a local story national) will probably have more people looking at coaster supports with the potential of more reports in the coming weeks. This will surely amount to a little downtime for the rides while parks inspect and make what are essentially cosmetic repairs, but if it instills confidence in the public it’s probably worth it.