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ALEX LEARYLong lines at the amusement park. Discomfort. The heat of August. Not such a great day. And it got worse.
Hawley and Cynthia Webb tightly gripped the handlebar as the Fire Dragon lurched forward.
Their excitement grew with each click of the track, then exploded as the roller coaster whipped through a series of twists and loops.
People shrieked. So did Hawley.
"Oh my God, oh my God," he cried out.
Hawley's "having the time of his life," Cynthia thought.
"I lost it," Hawley Webb III screamed.
"What?" she shot back.
"My leg."
"I looked down at the stump," Cynthia said, "and his leg was not attached."
The whole day had gone badly.
The Webbs traveled from New Port Richey to Universal Orlando on Aug. 7 for their first vacation in five years and soon found themselves in a long line for the Incredible Hulk Coaster at Islands of Adventure.
After an hour of waiting, Hawley's right leg, amputated at the knee, began to hurt. It started to rub raw against his prosthesis. "I can't do this all day," he thought.
But he sucked it up for his wife's sake. They finally boarded the Hulk, which begins with a bang: Riders are launched from 0 to 40 mph in two seconds.
"It was a good ride, but not worth the wait," Hawley, 34, said in an interview at his home Thursday. He and his wife wandered over to the Spider-Man ride and saw another line. So they plunked down $25 each for a Universal Express pass - a legal shortcut of sorts.
Hawley Webb, known to friends as Todd, severely damaged his right leg in a motorcycle accident in 1986. "I was passing a car, and the oncoming car did not have its lights on."
Doctors managed to salvage the leg, but a bone infection called osteomyelitis set in and in 1998, the leg was amputated at the knee. Hawley is now on disability; his wife works at a pet shop.
The leg lost last week was Hawley's second prosthesis and by far his favorite. The $13,500 leg was specially made with the logo of his beloved Miami Dolphins.
To attach the leg, Hawley first pulls a long rubber sleeve over his stump and up his right thigh to his groin. A screw protrudes from the end of the sleeve and is used to lock into the prosthesis. To demonstrate the device's fortitude, Hawley's doctor once dragged him around by his fake leg.
At Universal, Hawley's discomfort had not subsided, but the couple jumped from ride to ride. After stopping for drinks, they arrived at the Dueling Dragons attraction about 4 p.m.
The line was short, leading the Webbs to believe the ride was less intense than others.
Billed as the world's first inverted dueling roller coaster (legs hang free unlike other coasters in which passengers sit), Dueling Dragons consists of independent coasters, Fire Dragon and Ice Dragon.
"Choose your fate - fire or ice," Universal challenges riders. The attraction soars 125 feet in the air and reaches speeds of 55 mph, and the coasters pass within 13 inches of each other.
Their torsos wrapped in a yellow harness, the Webbs smiled as the Fire Dragon began its ascent. Click, click, click.
Hawley used to be afraid of heights but had come to relish the experience of roller coasters.
"I ride Montu all the time," he said of the coaster at Tampa's Busch Gardens that also lets riders' legs hang.
In Orlando last week, Hawley looked at the shrinking landscape, the vast horizon, in amazement. Suddenly, Fire Dragon cascaded down a steep hill, then rolled around corners and slopes.
The climax came when Fire met Ice in a tremendous loop.
The 10-pound prosthetic leg, Hawley thinks, came off about halfway into the duel. As he screamed to his wife, another thought entered his mind. What if the 10-pound leg hit someone? What if got lodged in the track?
"You figure coming off at that speed, it's like a missile," said Cynthia Webb, 32.
As the roller coaster came into the home stretch, Mrs. Webb shouted, "Stop the ride, stop the ride. He lost his leg."
They were horrified to see the Ice Dragon pushing off. The leg was not in the track after all, yet it remained missing.
The hours after the incident did not ease the pain, the Webbs said. They criticized Universal's response as haphazard, even cold.
Instead of finding Hawley crutches, an employee handed them a copy of the Yellow Pages. They spent the night driving around Orlando looking for crutches.
As of Thursday, a week after they returned, the leg remained missing.
The prevailing theory among park employees is the leg fell into one of two lakes below the roller coaster.
Divers were dispatched but came up empty. So the lakes were drained, and workers were to comb through the muck Thursday evening.
Universal says it will pay to repair the leg if it is found, or buy Hawley a new one if it cannot be recovered. The Webbs also will be given an all-expenses paid weekend at the park.
A spokeswoman said workers were caught off guard by the unique nature of the incident but stressed that Universal had taken steps to ensure Mr. Webb's comfort.
In the aftermath of the incident, which Universal said was the first of its kind, officials are reviewing the park's safety procedures. There is no warning to people with prosthetics.
As for Hawley Webb, he'll continue to ride roller coasters. "The ones where I don't have to worry about my leg getting away, I'll leave it on.
"But on the inverted ones, I'll take it off."