Former Jaws Skipper AMA on Reddit

[neoshinok]

Saw this on the front page of Reddit today. Pretty cool to see the different questions and responses.

IamA former skipper on the JAWS ride at Universal Orlando AMA! : IAmA

This was my favorite part of it:

Miss_Melusine 96 points 6 hours ago

That sounds like an awesome job. Best/most embaressing story? Do you swim-scuba-surf in the ocean and have the theme music going through your head? (I know I would.)
ShowScene5[S] 237 points 6 hours ago

It was an amazing Job. The pay was very low, just a bit over minimum wage, but I may have paid THEM for the job if I had to.

It is hard to label one of the stories I have as the "best" or MOST embarrassing. I've had/seen a lot of awesome/embarrassing things.

One story that sticks out to me is this: I was working as the Team Lead one particular day and was not on boat. Basically my job was to make sure everything was running well, plan rotations and breaks, and help out everywhere. I get a call to the unload dock as a boat comes around the corner. Strangely, I didn't hear the usual "Call off the Marine, we're coming hooooome!!!". The boat was full of guests, but the skipper was missing. Just as I was about to hit the E-stop, I see the skipper rise from the floor with a bloody face.

Apparently during the final scene (show scene 5) where the skipper vanquishes the great white with a combination of electrocution and grenades shot from a 50mm grenade launcher, she managed to hit herself in the head with the barrel of the weapon and knock herself silly and bloody her face.

These grenade launchers were, of course, props. They were made of wood and metal. The barrel as heavy and hard as any real weapon. Comparable to a shotgun. The grenade launcher is used throughout the ride as we timed our shots with pre-timed water mortars that shoot water in the air. The trick to making it look really good is in how you mimic the recoil of an actual weapon.

I had done some training with her and a few other recently hired skippers on how a real firearm reacts when fired. Well, apparently she took this training to heart and over-acted the last shot, popped the barrel of the launcher into her head, and knocked herself nearly unconscious. The look of terror on the faces of both the skipper and her audience was priceless.

She was ok, but was off-boat for a day or two to recover. I don't think she required stitches. She kept her bloody uniform as a souvenir, and if she ever does an AMA, I'm sure it'll be her proof.

 

[Parkscope Joe]

GREAT AMA. Just fantastic, wish we'd get a JC skipper (cough cough @JungleSkip) or another attraction to do one.

 

[neoshinok]

GREAT AMA. Just fantastic, wish we'd get a JC skipper (cough cough @JungleSkip) or another attraction to do one.

Yeah, I think this is the first AMA that I read the ENTIRE thing!

This answer was pretty crazy and interesting too:

Over the life of the ride, there were many notable incidents.

During Halloween Horror Nights, a drunk guest jumped overboard and swam to a dock on the other side of the lagoon. The skipper hit the emergency stop button, which instantly halts all effects and hydraulics and locks them where they are. This can be very damaging to the ride, depending on what is in motion. I understand he was arrested and trespassed.

If a guest is panicking, we had the ability to stop our boats by "dropping out of auto", basically pausing our forward movement on the track. We control the audio in the boats too. And we can turn the "rolling" motion off. So we would do all those before pushing the E-Stop because that affects the whole ride and could bring it down for hours depending on what might be damaged as a result. It would take a truly unsafe condition to do that.

We were always on the lookout for people standing or putting themselves in a position of falling out.

Here's a story, that I believe was prerry infamous on the attraction:

In the spring, the are can be inundated with duck families. Ducks and ducklings find their way into every body of water and lagoon on property. Even the Jaws lagoon. I don't know why they would even hang out more than 3 minutes with the fire, sounds, and water mortars, but they did.

One time a duck swam right over a mortar as it went off, sending the duck flying into the boat, bouncing off the canopy and falling dead and mangled into the lap of a little girl. With the girl thinking the skipper shot the duck. The family was compensated greatly by guest relations and we were were thus authorized to perform "duck stops" or e-stops for duck safety to avoid a similar incident from occurring that season. This story was thereafter included when training new skippers about emergency stop procedures.

 

[Ash]

great read, love the how to tuna fish too ha ha ha