disownedpear

I'm not engineer but are these counterweight models inherently more dangerous? I never see them in the US. Or is just another bad locally built ride?

If you get offended by the words "third world country" on this forum you're sure not going to like the rest of the internet.

This thing is so twisted I'm surprised to see that bit of straight track above the water.

On a slow day, it's normal to only have 1-4 flights, which barely even covers the employee salaries. If there's an event or something it can get really busy, with maybe 40 flights completed by the end of the day. But most of the time it's like you said, completely dead. It's extra terrifying because if you look up when you're at the top of the tower, the cables are slack. When you pull the cord it disconnects you from the launch cable and you go into total freefall for about 25-60? feet, depending on the model, before the cables catch you. So for a second or two there there is literally nothing holding you. It's not like a drop tower since you literally have nothing to hold on to and the suits are much scarier than a drop tower seat. That's what makes it scarier than other rides for me.

Skycoaster is an extremely safe company. They are allowed to say a Skycoaster wasn't maintained properly, and then force the park to remove it. Rumor has it that this is what happened to Six Flags America's Skycoaster but who knows. I've visited the one at Darien Lake and Kings Dominion and both seemed totally up to code, it's a pretty simple ride not too many things can go wrong. One thing I would worry about at smaller parks and parks in other countries is the Overspeed Clutch Assembly, which prevents the winch from spinning out of control in the event of a hydraulic failure. In fact, one of the maintenance people at my park tried to get me to sign off on the test without actually doing it, I of course said no and we ran the test. So that makes me think that fudging the inspections probably isn't uncommon around smaller parks. Even so, you're probably still safe, I don't believe an Overspeed Clutch failure has ever happened. Did she enjoy it? In my experience 99.5 percent of people do.

It's just for comfort it falls out during flight all the time. If properly tightened it shouldn't fall out though, it's mostly kids who get scared and go into the fetal position. They had to redesign the footbar a few years ago because too many of them were flying off and becoming projectiles!

When a Skycoaster is struck it requires maintenance to redo Daily, Weekly, Monthly, and Yearly inspections. Which takes a while.

We are extremly strict about loose articles, you're not even allowed to wear a necklace. The main reason for this is once we lay the fliers down, we don't want them getting stabbed by their loose articles on their neck or in their front pocket. Stuff not flying off is just an added bonus, and as such I've never seen an object fly off the ride. You guys are making me curious, I'm going to bring a bouncy ball on my next flight, let go of it and see how far it goes ha.

Surprisingly it's not really a nausea inducing ride since it doesn't go in circles. A Tilt-a-Wirl has more pukers than any other ride I've seen, I'm no health expert but it seems the more spins on a ride the more nausea. I have to admit it would be cool to see how far the puke would go; as long as I don't have to clean it up. Feel free to ask techincal questions since Site Controllers have to know everything about the ride and it's maintenance. But I'm happy to answer any kind of question.

Yeah I always thought the whole ripcord thing was just a feature to make the ride more fun but nope it's just the cheapest way to release the fliers from the launch cable ha. The only automatic part on our ride is the winch, everything else is either done by hand by us or the fliers. Other locations have automatic landing poles and scissor lifts, if anyone here has ran a location with those I'd like to hear about it.

The cheapest prices you will see in my experience is 15-20 dollars, more typically they are 30 or more but some parks give discounts. The 300 foot one in Kissimmee is only 20 dollars with the purchase of an all day wristband, so that has to be the best deal. I bring my Site Controller certificate to other parks and they always let me ride for free, so become an operator for the best price! In terms of crowds the time to do it doesn't really matter since I've never seen a line at my location or any others I've visited. Like any other tall ride, night is my favorite time to ride.

Hey guys, I've been operating a Skycoaster for the better part of a year now. I am a certified Site Controller, meaning I had to pass a written and physical exam. Skycoaster is operated very, very differently than normal rides, so I'm happy to answer any questions about it, I'll answer anything except which one I operate. I've also operated plenty of other rides so I'm happy to answer questions about those as well.

I disagree. I see it the same as I would see a 70 year old person, even though they don't retain much from when they were younger I still respect the age. If they completely took a wooden coaster and rebuilt it it would be different, but since the wood is replaced organically over time the age is notable.

^I think that question deserves to be it's own post I'm curious as to why? At least in my state the carnivals are as safe as the parks, but I know regulations vary from state to state. I've always wonder what the incident rate at carnivals vs. permanent parks is but I haven't been able to find any info.

Has anyone figured out if Centrifuge is going to be a real Scrambler or a Sizzler? IMO a Scrambler running at it's full speed of 11 rpm is much more fun than a Sizzler running at full speed, the problem is some parks don't run their scramblers at full speed.

Yeah, I was extremely grateful for those operators, they pretty much made our trip. I got two "Way to Go!" things from guest services and gave them to the guy who told me about the damage and the guy who ran the 5 minute cycle. For people who don't know what that is, If there's any employee you think is doing an exemplary job you can tell guest services and they'll give you a coin sized wood circle with "Way to Go!" on it, and then you give it to the employee and they can exchange it for cash I think? Most people don't know about it so it really makes the ops happy I would certainly recommend.

I don't know the extend of the damage to the vehicles, It could have been something really small for all I know. But yeah if it seriously damages them that would be a problem, but I think since the ride has been running for almost 80 years the same way that they think it's not a problem. I've never seen the flyers closed, I of course wouldn't want to ruin a day for an entire park just so I could snap around.

I don't see another ride focused on inversions going in there, we already have FoF, Anaconda and Dominator.

Monday and Tuesday everything was a walk on it was incredible. Mildly interesting story about the flyers, me and my partner were able to find an operator who would not slow the wheel under any circumstances, leading to by far the craziest snapping I've ever had, I got knocked so hard I couldn't keep my hands on the sail. We rode it all day whenever he was operating it. Fast forward to Wednesday, I get on the ride with the same op and he walks over and basically says "Maintenance had to fix four of the vehicles yesterday, so they checked the camera footage and saw that I was letting you guys do that, and I've been told not to. I wish I could let you do it but I can't." Dude was really nice I wish they would just let the ride run the way it's designed. Anybody know any good tips on how to get good ops on this thing? There was one dude who was really strict but then like 10 minutes before closing I asked since we were the only people on it if we could do it, and he said yes and sent us on a 5 minute cycle of insanity. But short of that I can't think of a way to guarantee you'll get a fast ride. Also that haunted house was terrifying and amazing wish I hadn't missed it on my past visits.

Another year of expansion, they moved the Tilt-a-whirl from it's old position to next to the golf course to make way for the new path. Rumor has it a Ferris wheel will be added along with another flat. Really happy to see this park doing well.

Seabreeze was my first park and is really an awesome and unique park. The spinning mouse is actually a fantastic coaster, and runs faster than any others of that model that I have ridden. The bobsled was my first coaster and is super fun and unique. Jack Rabbit is a cool historic ride but I don't think it is very special, the tunnel at the end is very fun however. The log flume has the most extreme drop of one I have ever ridden. Definitely the best park in New York, but I can't say the competition is very strong.

I wish more parks would look at their history and try to bring rides back.

Has anyone been to the park for the opening weekend, specifically Sunday? If so what was it like? I remember when I went to KD on opening day and it was more crowded than I have ever seen it, but at least all the rides were open.

I hear the SLC at Darien Lake used to have various issues, resulting them in slowing the lift to a crawl.

I don't see the mountain staying, but maybe people will assume it will since it stayed after the last batch of attractions left it.