Working at Dreamworld for five years, maintenance supervisor Stephen Murphy was the first witness to give evidence at the resumed inquest on Monday morning.

Mr Murphy was not at the Thunder River Rapids Ride during the tragedy on October 25, 2016, when four people died, but he had experience in managing the engineering teams that maintained the ride.

The inquest is seeking to determine what happened on the day that Sydney mother Cindy Low and Canberra visitors Kate Goodchild, her brother Luke Dorsett and his partner Roozi Araghi died when the raft they were riding in collided with an empty raft and flipped over.

Mr Murphy recalled attending the ride in the days before the tragedy for similar electrical earth faults.

Questioned over his previous experience in factory design including extensive workplace health and safety assessments, Mr Murphy said in his previous 25-year role he was trained and qualified in workplace health and safety assessments.

Barrister for the Low family Matthew Hickey asked Mr Murphy if the construction of the Thunder River Rapids Ride’s timber-slat conveyor belt had ever raised concerns.

The conveyor belt was designed with two full-length timber slats spanning the width of the water channel, and then shorter slats between them on top of the conveyor chains.

“Did it ever occur to you that the distances between the two full-length slats might present a pinch risk?” Mr Hickey asked.

“In hindsight it did but not at the time,” Mr Murphy said.

Steven Whybrow, the barrister representing the father of victims Luke Dorsett, Kate Goodchild and the partner of Ms Goodchild, questioned Mr Murphy on whether he was aware of the Dreamworld initial emergency response team document, which detailed who had to respond to various emergencies.

“The Rapid Ride Alarm will be sounded when the main water pumps stop for this ride. If the pumps stop for this ride then there is the potential for the rafts to become a hazard to the guests riding them,” the document stated.

Mr Murphy said he had not seen the document.

Asked by Coroner James McDougall what would happen if the water level in the ride dropped and the conveyor was not stopped by the operator, Mr Murphy said the consequences would be what had happened on the day of October 25.

Another memo from the supervisory team told Thunder River Rapids Ride operators to stay “vigilant” when monitoring the conveyor for any obstructions that could interfere with rafts such as bent or broken brackets.

“If you identify an issue of this nature, operators are to bring all rafts home and call for an ‘Operational ASAP’ via control on 325 and wait further instructions from a supervisor,” the memo concluded.

Mr Whybrow questioned if there was “false logic” in telling operators to move rafts back to the loading area if they’d noticed a broken bracket on the conveyor belt, as it could put more rafts on the potentially damaged conveyor.

The memorandum was not read by Mr Murphy, he said, and wasn’t sent to his maintenance team as it was a memo for load operators, not park technicians.

“Do you see any problem with this memorandum?” Mr Whybrow said.

“No,” Mr Murphy said.

Mr Whybrow asked if it wasn’t wiser for an operator who identified a conveyor fault to stop the ride immediately, rather than load more rafts onto the conveyor before stopping the ride.

“It would depend on the problem,” Mr Murphy said.

Mr Whybrow questioned why the memo told ride operators to bring all the guests back onto the conveyor belt during a potentially dangerous situation rather than stopping the ride and calling for a maintenance supervisor to assess the issue immediately.

“You’re asking the $23-an-hour load operators to assess that risk, aren’t you?” Mr Whybrow said.

“They haven’t been told to assess the risk, they’ve been told to follow the procedure,” Mr Murphy said.

Mr Murphy disagreed that engineers were ever placed under pressure by supervisors to get rides back up and running after a fault, saying there was a level of competition amongst technicians to find faults.

He said it was a “badge of honour” to find problems on rides.

Mr Murphy was released from the stand at 11am and Dreamworld maintenance planner Grant Naumann, who was on duty the day of the tragedy, was next called to give evidence.

The inquest continues.