Safety Work Finished, Knott’s Puts Coaster Back on Tracks : Theme parks: The wooden GhostRider had been closed since a piece of wood came loose last week, injuring five.

Pledging that an accident that injured five people “can’t happen again,” Knott’s Berry Farm reopened its signature GhostRider roller coaster Sunday after installing a double-reinforcement of spikes and metal straps.

Billed as the longest wooden coaster in the West, the GhostRider reopened at 3 p.m. after a final battery of tests to check that the repairs hadn’t created new stresses that could jar riders or the structure of the 115-foot-high thrill attraction.

The tests, in which data from electronic gauges were printed out like the results of an EKG, showed the ride delivered only “a nice, appropriate rattle and roll,” said Richard Brown, a biodynamics consultant hired by the park after last Monday’s accident.

Five people were struck by a 3-foot piece of wood that snapped loose beneath the train and flew into the air. The most serious injury was to a 58-year-old visitor from Japan, who was hospitalized overnight with a 4-inch gash on his head.

Park attendees were disappointed earlier in the day when they were turned away from the still-closed ride. That reaction turned to elation when park employees began waving visitors into the mine-shaft-like entrance to one of the most popular rides at the Buena Park amusement park.

John and Sharon Igel of Long Beach decided not to ride the GhostRider--but only because the wait stretched to 45 minutes soon after the attraction reopened.

“It’s a little piece of trim wood that came off the ride,” John Igel said. “It’s not basically unsafe.”

About 2 inches wide by 2 inches deep, the board that shook loose was on the top layer of a stack of lumber that the ride travels over.

The board was partly decorative and was used to keep the track width the same through the curve.

Similar pieces of wood have been used on wooden coasters since at least the 1920s, said Brown, who added that it was a “freak accident” that a nail holding the board wiggled loose, allowing it to pop up, become caught on the coaster and then thrown into the air, striking visitors.

The ride manufacturer, Custom Coaster Inc. of Cincinnati, had recommended that each of the hundreds of similar pieces of wood be secured with long, ribbed nails.

Knott’s General Manager Jack Falfas said the park did that and took the extra step of securing each piece with three metal straps, so the pieces cannot come loose even if the nails do.

“That same failure can’t happen again,” Brown said as trains stocked with dummies were launched on test rides before GhostRider reopened.

The ride’s closure cut into attendance during the peak summer season, Falfas said.

The ride will be closed to the public in late September and again in January for previously scheduled maintenance.

According to amusement park industry statistics, 80% of thrill ride accidents can be blamed on riders.

But the Knott’s accident, along with a series of problems at other parks, “have reversed that trend recently,” Falfas acknowledged.

The accidents have included one that killed a tourist at Disneyland on Christmas Eve--which state officials blamed on an inadequately trained worker--as well as a double-fatality Saturday on a roller coaster in New Jersey that apparently malfunctioned.

Another fatality occurred at Paramount’s Great America in Santa Clara on Aug. 22, when a mentally and physically disabled 12-year-old slipped out of a ride and plunged to his death as his mother looked on.

Santa Clara police said that they are investigating statements by witnesses that a park safety worker did not check whether the boy was seated properly on the ride.

A California Senate committee last week voted to require statewide inspections of all amusement park rides, legislation prompted by the Disneyland fatality.