Alpenguy

I saw a FAMILY-leash the other day. I kid you not, the 5 people were leashed together with little caribbeaners holding 3 kids to one adult, and then the other parent attached also to the other side of one kid. It was really hard not to laugh. Also, the turnstile was pretty funny to watch when they got there.

I've never heard of an actual case of a child being abducted from a theme park. It's a big urban legend, but I know for 100% fact that it's never happened at Disneyland (biggest subject of it all) and quite simply, if someone was trying to abduct a child an amusement park would be the absolute stupidest place to try. It's strange SFDK requires a radio to do anything about it though.

Turns out the first girl I kissed at 12 or so is most certainly lesbian. Ah the wonders of myspace...

Man that made me miss my old home park. Nice TR, thanks for a good read.

Is the ride a mini-skycoaster from a crane, or what? I remember seeing one at the CA fair that seemed pretty ghetto, but aside from having a crane as the main arch it seemed just as safe as a typical full skycoaster. As usual it's hard to tell from the article.

I love riding Matterhorn A with a really heavy sled, it's just so outrageously bumpy and fast. You'd really think it's going more than 20mph... Did I just call you fat? ...seriously though, nice TR.

The guy who does the normal park announcements (like fireworks, closing announcement, etc) also has announcements to clear out service vehicles and such right before opening. I think it's a cool touch.

That comes pretty frighteningly close to the ground. Definitely looks like an amazing experience and sensation of flight, though I wish the guy with the camera got a shot of the lower anchor point... I guess it's just a big tower?

^ Cause Intamin failed at naturally safe restraint designs for many, many years and had several large people fly out of them. I imagine the seatbelts aren't easily-replaced and don't get removed before sitting out overnight and whatnot, so variances are probably not constantly checked or changed. Still, it seems strange that they could vary so much.

Best: Top Gun at PGA. The corkscrew/helix right over the water is ridiculously intense, and the best use of water on a coaster I've ever experienced. It's so intense, when I rode Nemesis I was disappointed the ending roll/helix wasn't as wild as TG... I also think the ending on Space Mountain at DL is fantastic, mostly for the show effect that enhances the deceleration and makes it seem like stars are shooting past you. Worst: Any lift hill ending. Fire on Dueling Dragons also sure has a lot of lame straight track in the end that just sorta runs it back around the park wall, and any wasted potential on a B&M invert makes me deeply sad.

Get some POG. Best drink ever, and I don't think it's available outside Hawaii. Passion Orange Guava

I can't believe they can even measure .014in over an entire tower cable, that's just amazing... I remember seeing Drop Tower at PGA get re-cabled midseason in 2001, it took about 10 days including testing. Not a huge deal, though it'll be interesting to hear how old the cables at SFKK are.

Possible theory in my mind that's different from a randomly breaking cable: This all depends on whether the lift car cables are all 3 lifted by the same motor, or if each one is lifted on a separate drive with a tension control system. Suppose one of the 3 cables on a catch car has a drive failure, and the ride doesn't register a fault. That cable would be hanging slack in a big loop, able to wrap around drop shuttles and guests. The ride drops as usual and the shuttle gets tangled in the slack cable on the way down. This could also happen if the top end of a cable came undone from the raising mechanism and got stuck at the top of the tower, which would be possible still if it's one drive system for all 3 cables on each car. If I remember, the cables are done with a standard sort of fastener on each end, looped around and bolted instead of some fancy whole-cable weave incorporating loops in one solid piece. It just makes more sense to me than a randomly breaking cable, considering that stuff should be checked pretty much daily. Whatever happened, if it was anything like my little theory there the ride should've faulted if properly designed and never released the car, or even lifted it the whole way. Smart and complete safety design is not something I think of first when "Intamin" and "1995" are thrown next to each other, but still I'd like to hope my idea there would be caught by a computer and is all just incorrect pondering.

You definitely just added another place to my must-visit list... It's so great to see all around fantastic parks that us folks on the coasts normally never hear about just cause they don't have a movie-studio name in front.

Don't go to Top Gun first. Everyone does, when I worked it our longest line of the day was almost always right at opening. Go to the back of the park where you can marathon Drop Zone, hit Invertigo (super slow line in the sun) and Psycho Mouse (another very slow line, unless CF finally got the ops to actually use the dispatch interval Arrow designed) and then worry about Top Gun, which has no more than a 20 minute wait with an almost full queue unless the crew is a bunch of failures.

The time to go to Disneyland is when it's all tourists... real tourists. When the park is full of Australians and folks who are around for several days and are in no hurry, everything is simply awesome. Guests are all relaxed, everything is super efficient since there's a lot more general understanding of how to get in and out of rides and such, and people are mostly pretty classy. Summer and local school holidays...

That's a pretty tame incident compared to many I've heard of at various parks, let alone the full closure of a certain park I worked at on 4/20 about halfway through the day cause of just so much crap going down.

Oblivion actually has a really unusual queue setup. The ride tandem loads (2 trains at once) and splits the queue very early on, and it's just two wide paths with a chain between going up a big spiralish ramp setup. Then each one splits and goes through a little cage jetway sort of elevated tunnel to the station, where things get even more unusual. Oblivion tandem loads but has two airgate rows for each row on the train. It's basically labeled like: {1A}{1B} {2A}{2B} ____ {1C}{1D} {2C}{2D} One train will pull so it's lined up with the A rows, the one behind it lined up with the C rows. They load, then both depart together with C waiting at the base of the lift until A reaches the top. When the next pair of trains pull in, they line up with the B and D rows, which open and let people board, then the trains dispatch and the process repeats. It's a pretty cool setup that lets groups figure out how people will be filling up the 8 seat rows with plenty of extra time, and the signs are very well done so it's extremely clear how everything works. I don't think there was an actual grouper, but the guests at Alton Towers didn't even have any need for them and acted very intelligently and courteously. I was shocked the way people perfectly filled up each row in the Nemesis station with 4 people, then everyone waited at the station entry and then filled in rows once that train was loading, every time! On top of all that, all the other guests were great fun to wait and ride with, though trying to understand a really cute girl from Manchester sure was frustrating.

I just think it's funny how examples of these things are always people with minor or pre-existing conditions who are hungry for money. Did I say money? I meant attention. (money) It's never major parks either, yet somehow the "Jim-Bob's Funhouse Happyslide" somehow directly connects to the newest hypercoaster 8 states away.

Best time to ride Matterhorn is later in the day when the line is on one side of the mountain for both sides (cause of the parade). Much shorter wait, and you can still choose. Don't wait too long though, since generally one side closes about an hour before closing unless it's a really busy night. Also, you can ask for the front.

I really like that landscape frame night Matterhorn shot.

I think the scale and length of the Florida dark ride portion is better, and the opening animatronic (when it works) is AMAZING. So articulate and intimidating. Even though the coaster part in Florida is short, I think it's far more exciting and intense. The incline launch is a cool twist, and I didn't find the backwardness to the Hollywood version all that incredible anyways. It's dark, not a huge change either way. Regardless of everything else, I think the Florida one wins at life with the fake station and PREPARE TO FORFEIT YOUR SOULS! bit. A question for any hot (or not!) Mummy operators: Can it cascade, or does the ride have enough hold zones and such?

A TON of hardcore Disney fanatics will show up on June 11th, I'm scared to think of how long the line will be the first few days. It's expected to be around a 3 hour wait during the summer.

I think these accidents are mostly from a lack of training. If operators are only taught basic "push the green button to dispatch" stuff, and not how to safely evacuate a ride themselves or basic lockout safety and such, there's a lot of temptation to try and do things illegitimately since people don't know how with the proper procedures. That, and it's easy to get comfortable and forget that a ride doesn't have a brain or any awareness beyond the simple inputs. I think every ride operator has done that at some point to some degree.

Those are really cool pics! What's the difference in style between the two Winjas? Or did you just mean both are a different experience in general?