KevinM

Does Avalanche/Hellcat still have the five-ride limit?

Yep, this is the one that's in the site controller manual. For those who don't know, three employees decided to fly, hooking themselves facing the opposite direction of normal (although the cables twist during most flights). This particular site had the manual Rolling Boarding Platform rather than a scissor lift. RBP's have to be rolled away and tethered a certain distance from the low point of the swing. These employees left the RBP out at the low point and struck it three times before another operator could get it out of the way. The police were called and quoted as saying "I could smell [intoxicants] on them.". So that's really the only thing that could happen on a Skycoaster, and most sites user the scissor lifts anyway. The flight crew can't start winch-up without the lift all the way lowered on scissor lifts, so accidents really can't happen. It's too bad that the SCAD towers are not so safe. I think it could be done effectively.

It seems like a total failure that the ride can operate like that. I'm a fully certified Skycoaster operator, so I've seen first hand how well designed they are, as well as how protective Skycoaster, Inc is of their rides. Skycoaster is very hands-on. They require that a "site controller", certified by the company is on the site at ALL TIMES. Even if the site controller is just going to the bathroom, operation must cease. Also, Skycoaster has made several preventative changes over the years to keep their safety record clean. But most importantly, there's just no way to operate the ride that would put the rider in danger, save for two things. One involves leaving the "rolling boarding platform" out, at the few sites that use those. The other would involve a deranged operator hooking flyers up via the release system, which isn't really possible, but if you're determined, it can be done. All that adds up to Skycoaster never having a death, and only one major injury (drunken irresponsible employees, who hooked themselves up in reverse and left their boarding platform out in the flight line). Whoever designs the SCAD towers must figure out a way that a person cannot be released without the net in place. They should probably also implement a "site controller" system. One major injury is too many.

My guess is that they are going for world's tallest coaster. I have no information to back this up, but it just seems like a good fit. Magic Mountain has received plenty of innovative/record breaking rides, and it's about the right time for them to get another. I think the LSMs are probably gone. Again, pure speculation. I could see them building a rocket coaster with the existing structure. We should start a pool. TPR BOC for the winner?

Have you considered Platinum Flash Pass? Platinum has a nominal wait time of "10%", which is essentially INSTANT riding. Plus you get wristbands that allow you to double ride, if you want to. I've done Gold on a busy day at Six Flags Great America, and certain waits were in excess of 30 minutes. Keep in mind that the "75% reduced" wait time is the MAXIMUM reduction. Lo-Q's system adjusts the reservation time in an attempt to eliminate "bunching" at the integration point. That I know for sure. The way it seems to work (based on my observation) is that only a few groups are allowed to reserve a ride for a certain minute. The next group has to wait for the next minute or so. A REALLY POPULAR ride will have well over a hundred Q-bots waiting for it, so the wait time gets extended to more than the 25%. With a Platinum you would most definitely get everything done. Gold is pretty good too, but honestly if you're going for gold, platinum isn't much more. Although it does run out very quickly.

One thing of note on the Premier trains is that the butts in the seat are WAY recessed. I'm tall, and my knees are equal with my chest level on Freeze, FOF, etc. The Premier design also restrains your legs, possibly to prevent a rider from slipping out. So presumably riders need to be positioned differently for inversions. Consider that OTSRs prevent you from leaning forward. This could be a factor. One thing that I don't see is putting OTSRs on non-inverting rides. See: Kingda Ka (considering Dragster runs without them), Intimidator 305... Why OTSRs on these two? Ultimately, I think OTSRs may just be a holdover from the days before computers, i.e. the early Arrow days.

NINETY DEGREES! NEGATIVE NINETY DEGREES!

^The Discover promotion has been going on all season. There are lots of signs, audio announcements, and cashiers "remind" customers of the 5% discount for using Discover. However, I have not seen one Discover representative in the park (Great America) attempting to sign up new members. This may change, but I haven't seen it yet.

Well... if the park isn't getting Chang, and the waterpark needs expansion... DELUGE! They should get Deluge from Kentucky Kingdom. Or a brand new water coaster.

I wish this could be a photo TR, but only waterproof cameras are allowed, which I don't have. I'm not really the kind of person who gets any enjoyment from lying on a tropical beach all day, so I was not looking forward to our family trip to Mexico. But our family did visit a place that blew away our expectations and made the trip worthwhile, XPLOR. Xplor is a new park (less than a year old) operated by a company that owns two other Playa del Carmen resorts, Xcaret and Xel-Ha. Xplor is an adventure park set in underground caves amidst the Mayan jungle. There are only four activites (plus a buffet lunch) and the admission is a steep $99/person, but it's unbelievably worth it. Upon entering the park you are given a rock climbing helmet with a number and an RFID tag inside. The RFID tag is really cool because as you go through all the adventures, they will take a lot of photos of you, and you can view them just by stepping in front of a TV screen. It's pretty awesome and high-tech feeling. They'll also sell you the whole pack for $50. So after a lengthy walk through the cave, you reach a giant beating "heart", which is the center of the park. (Heart of the park... get it?) It makes navigating the park dead simple. Go to the heart, find the arrow to which activity you want to do, and go. You can not get lost. Lockers are included, which is nice and definitely a break from $14 lockers at Six Flags. Once you're ready to go, there are four options: Underground River Rafting, Underground River Swimming, Amphibious Vehicles, and the best part-- Zip Lines. We didn't do river swim, but I assume it's quite similar to the rafting. You get a fake wooden raft and two paddles that attach to your hands. There are solo rafts and two-person rafts. The river runs through the underground caves where there many many stalactites and stalagmites to see. The path is lighted, but still pretty dark. If you follow the lights, you'll be find, but there are several places where people make wrong turns (which don't take you far off course, you just have to turn around). The first half of the run was not fun because we kept getting stuck behind people who do not understand how to steer a raft. Once we passed them, it was fun, but not all that exciting. There are two circuits that you can take, each is about a half of a kilometer. The rule at XPLOR is that you may only take each circuit once. At the popular attractions (zipline and amphibious) they will mark your wristband to enforce this. The underwater attractions were not popular enough for them to care. After being cooled down by the subterranean river, we went for the amphibious vehicles, as the ziplines were too busy at the time. There are again two circuits for the amfibios (the Spanish word) and each one is 5 kilometers long. The vehicles are John Deere brand and let off tons of gas fumes. They can get going pretty fast, but as we discovered, if the staff catch you "speeding" (there's no speedometer) they will actually cut in front of you and drive slow. I was not going that fast, but my brother did and ruined it for all of us. The trails run mostly through the trees (and there's not much to see) but they also go underground and in the water, as the name implies. The scariest, but most fun part is the bridge. The bridge has NO CENTER. But it's just an illusion of danger, as guard rails to the side will prevent you from falling in the middle. While you are peeing your pants at this bridge, they snap one of the many photos of you. After our runs on the amfibios the wait for zip lines had disappeared. This was the attraction that I was looking forward to most, by far. After a safety briefing they get you into your harness, which is just a simple rock climbing harness (Petzl brand). I've spent a lot of time with these harnesses so I feel really safe in them, but for the first-timers they can seem frightfully minimal. After passing the safety check, you have to climb a really tall tower to get to your first line. Just like the other activities, there are two circuits to choose. They are named "Jaguar" and "Deer". You get to make your choice at the top of tower one, as they both begin there. Deer is comprised of 6 shorter lines with fast acceleration. Two of them feature "water landings" into a natural pool, and there's also a water slide in the middle just for fun. If you're fully clothed, get ready to have soggy clothes the rest of the day, as there is NO escaping the water. I was in a t-shirt and bathing suit, which wasn't too bad. Jaguar has only 5 lines with only one water landing (and no slide) but in my opinion it's the more enjoyable course. The lines are longer and feature the two longest, tallest, and fastest ones. Although they are the fastest, the acceleration is slower than Deer because Jaguar is intended to be the more scenic run. The longest/tallest/fastest one is 45 meters high, over 700 m long, and tops out at 32 kph if I recall correctly. It takes over a minute to finish, which leads to a little bit of a line at this tower. It's the longest wait of the day, which is no more than 15 minutes. I slammed into the stopping blocks at the end of this one (which are hooked up to a bungee cord for a smooth landing) and nearly took out the operator. We did Deer first and Jaguar immediately after. In the scope of about an hour and a half I think I climbed as many stairs (and ramps) as the average person probably climbs in a month, at least. It was the most fun I've had without coasters, but it nearly knocked me out as I don't stay in shape. Luckily there was a buffet lunch waiting for us after the zip lines, included with admission. We couldn't believe it, but this was the best. meal. period. of our stay in Mexico. They had a full salad bar (lettuce is hard to find in Mexico, at least in the all-inclusives) huge burgers and seasoned fries (which were in my opinion as good or better than TGI Friday's or Applebee's) as well as typical Mexican fare (not really my thing). We couldn't believe that an adventure park had that could blow away our several-thousand-dollar all-inclusive (which served mediocre food at best). We only had about six hours in the park, but it was an incredible day and I already want to go back. I haven't done ziplines anywhere else, but I would go as far to say they have one of the best courses out there, if not the best. If you ever find yourself in or around Playa Del Carmen, Mexico, do yourself a favor and GO TO XPLOR. You won't regret it. Check it out at xplor.travel or their facebook page. Tower 7, the longest, tallest, and fastest zip line at Xplor. (Photo credit to Xplor) One of the "water landings" in progress. The caves you see in the back are real and run all over the park. (Photo credit to Xplor)

^^Traincrossin is pretty much right. Unlike most of the SF parks, Great America actually merges the flash pass queues just before the station on most coasters. That's the same system you would see at Disney. Demon, however, enters up the exit, which is the way many other SF parks use. The Flash Pass staff member at the merge point generally takes the place of the person at the station that controls the flow of guests into the station (which are rarely used anymore...). They hold up the regular line, and add in the flash pass users. If there is a big chunk of people, they will let a lot of them in. Then the Flash Pass user is free to go where ever they want in the station with everyone else. It's a much nicer system than say, Evel Knievel at SFSTl, where the flash pass riders come in from the exit and take any row they like, holding up the people next in line for that row. Even Deja Vu at GAm had a merge point line, but I don't recall Deja ever using Flash Pass/Fast Lane.

^The ride op that was doing this looked older and sounded more professional than a lot of ops. They actually switched positions and the next ride op didn't mention this policy as much, but he was talking a lot less in general. Like I said, I have no idea if this is an official policy but judging by the ride op's demeanor, it seems like the management is okay with it.

^Lines were not even back to the Flash Pass merge point yesterday. I have no idea if that policy will stick when there are crowds... On a side note, I wish more SF parks would have merge points for flash pass. GAm has them for almost every ride. Riders coming through the exit and taking your row is no fun.

Has anyone seen some of the changes in the Raging Bull station? First of all, they added a 60-second "shot clock" timing the train dispatches. Signs all around the station say "watch us beat the clock"! It starts at 60 and counts down. Of course it was a slow day with only two ops checking restraints, so they weren't making 60 seconds. When it gets to zero, it simply turns around and counts up. I've never seen anything like it, but if it keeps the ops (and the riders) motivated, good! There's also a very odd new policy about empty seats. The ops were telling riders that just got off the train that they were free to take any empty seats on the train. While it was nice to ride twice in a row, it made a mess of the station! Many people looking for the elusive re-ride walked very slowly towards the exit hoping to jump in an empty seat. I wish they would put in a single-rider line to fill seats.

I could never get them to work. So as far as that era of my life goes, I've stuck with the Razor scooter.

Evel Knievel?

Just another check mark in 5 gum's column, IMO.

^You don't even know what XKCD is, do you? Well I'll tell you. An occasionally funny, but highly overrated web comic that panders to nerds. I am a nerd, but I don't appreciate pandering over actual humour.

I absolutely love Ubuntu (and Linux in general) but my old HP hardware does not like to play friendly with the lastest versions. And windows 7 has thoroughly impressed me, so I've left the Ubuntu tribe for now.

They stacked rather regularly. Holiday World spends a lot of time making sure the seat belts are really tight, causing it to take longer to check the trains. Unfortunately, it would have made more sense to have two PTCs, knowing they would stack, and three Timberliners, since load times should be greatly improved without seatbelts. That's exactly what I was thinking. Great capacity with 2 timberliners, Excellent with 3! Remember that Holiday World will get a lot more Louisvillians this year but they may have not known that at the time of purchase! I agree that Holiday World ought to have three trains for Voyage if it's supported... but remember HW is still a small operation. The cost of Wildebeest and the two first-ever Timberliner trains probably has them at their budget for the year. But if attendance is good this year, down the road I can see them picking up another Timberliner... or five.

Not street view, but the brand new "earth view"...

^I peruse coffee forums and the like quite a bit, and I've never seen this "Blue Mountain" coffee referenced. That's not to say it's necessarily bad, but usually a coffee worthy of that kind of price tag makes a name for itself. The current most expensive coffee is of the Gesha varietal from Hacienda La Esmeralda in Panama. Certain lots of this Gesha have sold for over $100/pound unroasted! The bulk of it is sold at around $30/pound unroasted, but that is still incredibly high! Many roasters were asking for $100+ /pound for it roasted. I have never tried it, but I'm sure its... good. Worth the price, I doubt it. Instead of chasing some magical coffee at a ridiculous price, I work on getting the most out of "lesser" coffees. A great coffee, even $100/pound coffee means nothing if it's not fresh. A good grinder is imperative. Also one must mind the freshness of the roast. I've just begun to do my own roasting, and it's fantastic. Believe it or not, I do it in a popcorn popper, as shown in this coffeegeek article. Anyway, I'm dragging up a two-month dormant thread here but I could talk day and night about coffee. Here's another photo of my work: The most beautiful cappuccino I've ever poured. Not the best tasting though.

^Obviously I can't speak for Six Flags, but as a regular guest of SFGAm (and former Deja Vu rider) I can see why they were removed. The technical/maintenance problems were bad, but not the only problems with that coaster. I think the biggest problem was LOW capacity. 300 riders per hour was normal. Deja had a horrible reputation for having a long, slow line. And that is not the impression six flags wants to give their guests. I'm really not sure why Magic Mountain has kept theirs.

It's fixed. I had an issue with the spelling of Sinise.

This one is just crazy. So ... RIGATONI SINISE: THE ESCAPE!