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Interesting Things Ride-Ops Do


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I was at the park today and noticed that the ride-ops for The Zephyr were actually playing a game of Simon Says while the ride was going, it was really cool to see ride-ops doing creative things like that! What things like that have you seen ride-ops do on their rides?

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On Beast a few weeks ago I heard a Ride Op. Said "Welcome to Beast" and than make a Roar noise. "Kings Island's Newest Coaster Diamondback" and made a snake noise. Said "Son of Beast is still the tallest and fastest Wooden Coaster in the world" and Said Ouch! Which even though I don't think Sonny is rough at all I thought that was kind of funny. He also said stuff about Firehawk and made a Hawk Noise.

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A couple years ago, it was raining in the early part of the day, but not enough to shut anything down. My buddies and I walked back to Top Gun (BEFORE name change, thank you very much). It was a walk-on/stay-on, so we marathoned it. With the rain, the ride op on the PA would say "Enjoy your ride on Kings Island's newest water ride, Top Gun!" We had fun because they were having fun with it.

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I've been on Zephyr a couple of times when the ride ops were playing Simon Says with the guests on the ride. It was quite fun actually.

Last summer my cousin and I were the next ones on Firehawk in Row 5 when all of a sudden the driver started beat boxing and all of the other ops started dancing to "Jump On It" This was one of the days I remember the most from last summer.

Also while I was in line for Son of Beast a couple weeks ago the ride op kept saying "Welcome back (insert train color) train, how was your ride?" Of course many people did not respond and his reaction was "Yeah I'll give you a little time to recoup after that ride" then he would say, "Ladies and Gentleman welcome to the Son of Beast, The only ride in Kings Island guaranteed to give you a headache"

I laughed at his statement and at the same time I saw pkiboy in the station agreeing but I still dont think its that bad of a ride. Just a normal wooden coaster that beats you around like it should in my opinion

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I was in line for the back row of AE, and the op goes. "How are you guyes".. and we reply back with a "good, you?" And he goes "Well, I had a headache so I asked if anyone had tylonal and this guy gave me enyzite". And I couldn't help but laugh! And he was all serious! Poor fella.

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While in line for Son of Beast on Friday, the ops were saying all of KI's records and past records, such as "Son of Beast, the tallest and fastest woodie in the world", or "Vortex, first rollercoaster with six inversions", and "Firehawk, the only flying coaster in Ohio", and "Flight of Fear, the first LIM launched coaster", etc.

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When I was working on TRTR (2003 so I am still allowed to say that!) I remember getting creative with the spiel in preshow. One portion went like this:

"When you enter the ride area, you will see a pouch in front of you. Please put your keys, wallets, flip flops, cell phones, glass eyes, fake limbs, toupees, wigs, cats, seeing eyes dogs, reptiles of any sort, and small children inside this pouch. If you lose any articles, we cannot retrieve them until after the park is closed, and Kings Island is not responsible for any damage done to any articles not secured in the pouch."

Or going over the main PA asking for Tom Braider to step forward (think about it for a second.)

Oh! And lets not forget asking people in preshow to "show proper veneration for Shiva."

There was also a group of the ops on that crew who would rotate antechamber and preshow, and act like we are giving an archeological tour of an abandoned temple...

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Do you still remember "The Name Game" song? It is where you say a name and the other person names a name that rhymes with it. I was working in Admissions during the day at Boomer Rang Bay along with the security people. We were playing The Name Game and I started off with Chuck for others to respond to. If you ever heard the song, that name is never mention in the song, except when kids are not present.

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The guy in Maverick's station would do a backflip if the incoming train would cheer loud enough. He also played a game where he would ask people for old cartoons that everbody forgets about. Doug and Angry Angry Monsters were his favorite. It makes the day more fun when the ride ops have fun.

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When we got seats 48, 49 and 50 on Delerium, they measured my youngest son, The guy with the microphone asked him how old he was and let him say "8" over the speakers. Then he asked my son if he was afraid, and my son said, again into the microphone "No! I've already ridden it three times this year!" The ride op then said, "Hear that ladies and gentlemen, anyone over the age of 8 who is afraid right now should be ashamed....." My kid was absoluely beaming!!!!!!

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When I was working on TRTR (2003 so I am still allowed to say that!) I remember getting creative with the spiel in preshow. One portion went like this:

"When you enter the ride area, you will see a pouch in front of you. Please put your keys, wallets, flip flops, cell phones, glass eyes, fake limbs, toupees, wigs, cats, seeing eyes dogs, reptiles of any sort, and small children inside this pouch. If you lose any articles, we cannot retrieve them until after the park is closed, and Kings Island is not responsible for any damage done to any articles not secured in the pouch."

Or going over the main PA asking for Tom Braider to step forward (think about it for a second.)

Oh! And lets not forget asking people in preshow to "show proper veneration for Shiva."

There was also a group of the ops on that crew who would rotate antechamber and preshow, and act like we are giving an archeological tour of an abandoned temple...

I remember being at Tomb Raider back in about 2004 and in the preshow room, a ride operator came out and Was Acting out commercials before the preshow started. He said things like "Freshness in a Spin, Plug it in plug it in." And other commercials.

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With the rain, the ride op on the PA would say "Enjoy your ride on Kings Island's newest water ride, Top Gun!"

I have often referred to Beast rain rides as rides on the world's longest water ride. I have noticed a certain supervisor of The Beast also likes this statement.

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On RWW, one ride op was asking if anyone knew how tall Diamondback was, how tall the drop was, how fast it goes, and how steep the first drop was. After not even thinking of the answers for those I fired them at him. He then said, " What's my middle name." Gotta love when people have fun with their jobs! Ronny, have you done anything when operating a ride? I vaguely remember you doing something on BLSC on the first day of Ride Warriors Weekend when all of us KIC'ers were riding.

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Ronny, have you done anything when operating a ride? I vaguely remember you doing something on BLSC on the first day of Ride Warriors Weekend when all of us KIC'ers were riding.

Yeah, he scared the crap out of me by saying my name over the PA! :lol: I'm climbing out of the train and I hear "Kat. Kat." Pause. "Kat." And I'm looking around like .. wtf, is God calling my name?! And there's Ronny in the drive box waving at me!

I love when the Diamondback crew dispatches a full train. The person in the drive box will say "A full train is a cool train!" and the rest of the crew does the wave and goes "Oooh!" They also say "Kings Island, Where else?" (crew response) "No where!" at the end of some of the spiels.

I've heard the world's longest water ride on Beast before, as well as Son of Beast, the only ride guaranteed to give you a headache. There's a ride op on Beast that used to work at Cedar Point and was entertaining us during the fireworks shutdown one night. He was doing some of the Dragster spiels, and then he'd try and edit them for The Beast's specs, that was pretty funny. He also did Beast/KI trivia and general crowd-entertaining things like who in the station was from the farthest away, who was the youngest, etc.

I've heard some really good ones this week. On Flight of Fear at KD, the op in the drive box always says something, either a countdown or "goodbye!" as you launch. During ERT on Griffon, the ops were having a ton of fun and coming up with all kinds of things to say like "watch out for that splash!" They also used the ride's specs such as "enjoy your flight from 205 feet" and stuff like that. During the Apollo's Chariot ERT, they were having races between the employees on each side of the train to see who could clear their side the first (and as a result had like 45 second dispatch intervals!) and were just generally having a lot of fun in the station. At SFA today, the ride ops were doing countdowns and "goodbye!" on Joker's Jinx and on the shoot-the-chutes ride (which DROWNS you) they were like "this is a nice full boat, enjoy getting drenched!" and would do the "On the count of three, how loud can you be?" and wouldn't dispatch the boat until they got a good reaction.

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There's one ride op at Beast who just loves interacting with park guests. Today she was singing "If you wanna ride The Beast, clap your hands!" again, telling people to scream so loud that Diamondback could hear them, etc. The best part though was when she learned that there was a girl on the ride celebrating her 8th birthday today, and proceeded to sing happy birthday as the train was leaving the station. It was a lot of fun.

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I've been on Zephyr a couple of times when the ride ops were playing Simon Says with the guests on the ride. It was quite fun actually.

Last summer my cousin and I were the next ones on Firehawk in Row 5 when all of a sudden the driver started beat boxing and all of the other ops started dancing to "Jump On It" This was one of the days I remember the most from last summer.

I was there for that too! That was hilarious!

I was on Viking Fury and someone was on his phone. The ride op came across the PA and said, "Please put away your phone." The man didn't respond. "If you are currently talking on your cell phone, please put it away." He continued talking. "If you are wearing a blue shirt and are talking on your cellular phone, please hang up!" He kept chatting. "SIR, PLEASE!!" The man looked around offended and red-faced, then stowed his phone.

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Maverick ride op: "Loose articles such as backpacks, sunglasses, bags, hats, barracudas, chia pets, brooms and dustpans are not allowed on this ride."

Mantis ride op: "Enjoy your wickedly twisted ride on the big bad bug."

Wicked Twister ride op: "You are launching in O M G *launch*"

Skyscraper ride op while I was at the top waiting for the ride to reload the other side: "Get ready to kick the sky in 3..2..1!"

I walked past the Corkscrew station in the pouring rain to hear the ride ops playing trivia games with people in the station.

I also like the "If you're ready to ride Diamondback, clap your hands" games.

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The guy driving Viking Fury on our last visit was great. After the ride, he'd say, "Welcome back riders, how was your ride?" When he got the response that you can just imagine he would, he said "Really, that bad? Well then, please exit the boat and find a ride you like better, I guess..." This got a good laugh from the people on the ride and from those waiting in the station.

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I have to mention a certain former Cedar Point employee that will greet a returning train on The Beast with, "Welcome back train 2, how was your ride? Yeah...don't care...they pay me to say that!" Or my personal favorite, "good....get out!"

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the Ride op on Firehawk, interacted with the crowd, like How many riders is this there first time.

ETC. he also started singin Poker Face.

*starts singing*

I wanna hold em like they do in Texas Plays

Fold em let em hit me raise it baby stay with me, I love it

Luck and intuition play the cards with Spades to start

And after he's been hooked I'll play the one that's on his heart

Oh, oh, oh

I'll get him hot...

*realizes no one wants to hear me sing*

"No! I've already ridden it three times this year!" The ride op then said, "Hear that ladies and gentlemen, anyone over the age of 8 who is afraid right now should be ashamed....." My kid was absoluely beaming!!!!!!

You're just a show off with your kid :P

Anyways, I can't think of entertaining things ride ops do except for the clapping games.

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