At the height of 168 feet 7 inches (51.38 m), Verrückt became the world's tallest water slide when it opened on July 10, 2014, surpassing Kilimanjaro at Aldeia das Águas Park Resort in Brazil.
[4] Verrückt was originally scheduled to open in June 2013, but difficulties during various construction and safety testing stages resulted in several delays.
The charges were ultimately dismissed with the finding of multiple procedural issues with the case's presentation by the Kansas Attorney General.
[3] In November 2012, Schlitterbahn announced plans to create the world's tallest and fastest water slide at its Kansas City park, to open in mid-2013.
[7] The water slide was spontaneously conceived by Henry at a trade show after a team from Travel Channel's Xtreme Waterparks asked what he was working on.
[8] Initial attempts to pitch the idea to vendors at the show failed,[2] so Henry decided to build the slide himself,[9] enlisting John Schooley as the ride's lead designer.
[3] Henry pressed his design team to complete the ride faster than usual, forcing many staff to work almost constantly.
[3][11] In November 2013, the ride was officially named Verrückt, the German word for crazy or insane, with the opening date pushed back until the start of the park's 2014 season.
[3] A safety consultant hired by the park shortly before Verrückt's scheduled opening told Henry it was unfinished and unsafe.
However, Henry and Schooley, while watching riders that day, noted how many rafts seemed to be going airborne on the lower hump into the emergency netting meant to keep them on the slide.
[20] However, at least thirteen riders suffered non-fatal injuries, such as concussions or slipped and herniated discs – many of which had long-term effects – after either hitting the netting or being thrown into it.
After a Missouri man thrown from the raft suffered facial injuries in June 2016, the park's operations manager allegedly attempted to cover up the incident, telling lifeguards what to write in their reports; it is believed that this happened with other accidents.
A local woman whose boyfriend held her in the raft likewise noted to Esquire that the netting and hoops on the lower hump showed signs of many human collisions.
[5] Their findings revealed that the use of the metal brace and netting system in the design,[10] along with the use of hook and loop straps to restrain the riders,[32] violated guidelines set by ASTM F-24 Committee on Amusement Ride and Devices.
[33] According to the guidelines, Verrückt should have incorporated rigid over-the-shoulder restraints for riders[32] and an upstop mechanism to prevent the rafts from going airborne.
[38][39] The ride's teardown was placed on hold indefinitely in August 2018, resulting from ongoing discussions in multiple court cases that were filed after the incident.
[10][43][44] The indictment accused the park of negligence, concealing design flaws, and downplaying the severity of previous injuries reported on the ride.
[53] On February 22, 2019, criminal charges were dismissed against Henry, Schooley, and Miles because inadmissible evidence had been presented to the grand jury.
[54][55][56] The judge's ruling reprimanded state attorneys for presenting the Xtreme Waterparks episode to jurors as fact, instead of as a "fictional and dramatized version of events created for entertainment purposes,"[57] and expert witnesses for claiming that the designers of the slide were negligent in not following ASTM standards, though the law at the time did not require that those standards be followed.