'World's tallest water slide' that decapitated kid explored in chilling documentary

A short documentary exploring the death of a 10-year-old boy while descending the 'world's tallest water slide' is available to watch on YouTube.

Kansas City's Schlitterbahn water park attraction Verrückt - translating to 'Crazy' or 'Insane' in German - was the scene of the tragedy nine years ago, where young Caleb Schwab lost his life via decapitation.

Designed by Jeff Henry and John Schooley, the towering coaster stood at just under 170 feet in height and sent its riders cascading at a speed of 70 miles per hour.

The Verrückt, which opened to the public in the summer of 2014 and cost $3.6 million (£2.8m) to construct, nabbed the aforementioned world record from Aldeia das Águas Park Resort's Kilimanjaro slide in Brazil.

Caleb lost his life to the ride. (Family handout)

On 7 August 2016, Caleb, whose dad Scott Schwab is currently serving as Kansas' Secretary of State, was joined by two women in his Verrückt raft, but an uneven weight distribution caused their vessel to go airborne and strike a metal pole supporting the safety net.

His fellow passengers survived, although one's jaw was broken and the other's face suffered a fracture.

The resulting documentary (titled The Water Slide), which was made by Nathan Truesdell for The Atlantic and released online in 2019, puts the horrendous ordeal under the microscope through news coverage and promotional footage.

"My first thought was that it must have been a freak accident—what a horrible, horrible story," Nathan told the publication.

"But once I took a closer look, I started to realise how complicated this story really was, and how this could have happened to anyone who went down that slide."

The filmmaker went on to elaborate: "There wasn't a lot of science or ride engineering involved in the testing and design.

"They were sending sandbags down and basically hoping that they didn't fly off of the slide. The netting that ultimately ended up killing the child was added to prevent the rafts from flying off of the slide completely."

In the immediate aftermath of the child's decapitation, Henry and Schooley's creation was officially marked for demolishment pending a criminal investigation.

The mourning Schwabs received £15.8m ($20m) from numerous parties, including Schlitterbahn, while the injured pair of riders made undisclosed court settlements too.

It took two months for Verrückt to be fully dismantled - starting in November 2018 after delays - and the now-closed water park's reputation was irreparably damaged.

As for Henry and Schooley, a March 2018 grand jury indictment accused them of lacking 'technical expertise to design a properly functioning water slide' and failed to adhere to standard engineering procedures.

Despite being arrested on a charge of second-degree murder and 17 further crimes, in February 2019, they were both given the all-clear due to inadmissible evidence.

This was down to state attorneys presenting a Schlitterbahn-favourable episode of Xtreme Waterparks as fact to the jurors, instead of the 'dramatised version of events created for entertainment purposes' that it was.