Shifts and scheduling

Although there is never a guarantee, in my experience, theme park jobs generally have three basic crews: opening, which works from early morning until shortly after lunch; mid, which works from late morning until early evening; and close, which works from mid-afternoon until an hour or so after closing. I quickly became part of the Kong closing crew. I also began signing up to stay for evening special events, when a corporation would rent out part or all of the park for a party. Those evenings are some of my fondest memories, as the crowds were thin, the guests were in a great mood, and leadership was relaxed.

Very early morning shifts are usually optional, and may provide an opportunity for overtime, which is otherwise notoriously hard to get approved. I let myself get talked into my fair share of those. These shifts generally involve cycling the ride vehicles to ensure that everything is working properly. At Kong, it meant sitting in the driver’s seat of a tram for hours, going around and around in circles to check out all the details of the special effects and call in any issues.

Pro tip: If you are a night owl, try staying up all night for a 6 a.m. shift. The Employee Grill is open all night, and the overnight maintenance crew is generally very cool and easy to get along with. You can even take a late night stroll through the park, relishing the darkness and quiet.

Ride operations

Naturally, each ride vehicle operates a bit differently. But what they all have in common is  that they are normally controlled by a computer system, with the crew having very little to do with actually making them run. On Kong, the tram drivers did have a button known as a deadman. We had to hold that down during the times that Kong was interacting with the tram to prove to the system that a human being was alive and in control. We also had to push a button to acknowledge minor faults, such as a loose door latch. Failing to do either of those things would result in a safety stop. Otherwise, though, the trams basically drove themselves.

However, many ride vehicles can also be operated manually, typically to move them around during opening and closing procedures or after a major system fault. On Kong, the manual controls consisted of a series of four knobs: up and down; back and forth; front and back roll; and side to side roll. Those were particularly useful when a tram ended up stuck in an awkward position. Depending on your attraction, you might have more or fewer controls.

One of the biggest challenges in a spiel attraction is learning to spiel over the radio chatter. At Kong, we wore large headsets with microphones whenever we were on a tram. The microphones allowed us to spiel to our guests and be heard over the noise of the attraction. We were responsible for keeping our spiels timed to the show audio, which was louder than everything else.

But the headsets were actually connected to the building’s radio communication system, so what we heard in our ears were the various conversations going on between team members, techs, leads, and supervisors. Each tram had a small microphone, similar to a CB, that was also connected to the building’s radio system. But we had to be careful to move the headset microphone first, so the guests on the tram would not overhear our conversations. Animal Kingdom’s Kilimanjaro Safaris ride has a similar setup, as did Universal’s Jaws. I would assume that the Great Movie Ride at Disney’s Hollywood Studios does as well, although I don’t have firsthand knowledge of that attraction.

Just another day in the life

Celebrity visits are a fact of life when you work for a theme park. But you must always remember the cardinal rule: you can be fired on the spot for asking for an autograph or photo, or in any way acting like a fan rather than a professional. Still, you are only human, and celebrity visits are always an exciting time. I actually traded shifts with my coworker and roommate one day, only to find out that he got to escort Metallica onto the ride! But I got my turn a few days later, when Liza Minnelli and her entourage were on my tram. I actually had to turn off my radio, because I couldn’t give an excellent show with all the excited chatter in my ears.