Kenban

It’s not a rumor. I know it was discussed by Jeff Gramke at Coaster Stock, and I am sure it’s been publicly discussed at other times. The trains that ran on The Beast this summer, are the original 4 bench trains from 1979 when the ride opened. It originally had 4 trains, each with five 4 bench cars, for a total of 40 passengers. During the rides first off season so before 1980, the park rebuilt the cars and chopped the cars chassis from 4 bench to 3 bench. They broke up the 4th train and added an additional car to the remaining 3 trains. So 3 trains, each with six 3 bench cars, giving each train a capacity of 36 riders. The park never has bothered to fix the loading area which is why the gates do not line up with the trains rows. The lead car from the 4th train was shorted to I believe a single row, and then given to an employee who retired as a gift. Which if you do the math leaves one final car which I have no idea what happened to. I am sure PTC would be willing to work on the trains, I am not sure if they would demand to replace modified items which would include the chassis. My opinion is that it’s time for the trains to just be replaced, even if it is just new PTC trains, it just feels like the current trains have just been modified too many times. Although a total rebuild by PTC would be nice if it includes them upgrading components. Foot pedals to unlock restraints instead of the nails. Upgraded restraint hardware so the park can do away with the 2 click rule and have similar policies to the rest of the chain.

The plans are shown on the news website linked earlier in the thread. It appears to be a multi-launch coaster. You can find no limits creations based on the plans on YouTube. But it’s only around 60 or 70 feet tall if I remember correctly, and the park stated in the planning permission requests that it would be a family coaster. So do not expect anything too crazy. Not enough details to figure out manufacturer, or type of train. I am kinda hoping for a Mack spinner like Time Traveler. But the layout looks more like an Intamin motorbike.

He acknowledged the photos but also basically stated the park is not ready to discuss anything about retracking work, and would share more information later. Gravity Group did a presentation and they confirmed they are working on The Beast but said nothing about what they are doing on the project. Overall not a lot.

I am at the ACE holiday party. Don has confirmed that the park is planning on going retro with the paint on Racer, it is planned to be red, white, and blue.

The paths into the helix are not large enough to permit heavy equipment access. If there is a need for something larger then what can fit through the existing opening it is normal to take down a section of a helix temporarily. The work in the helix looks like that to me, they want to get something larger then what can normally access the helix.

I suspect we will learn more information about this project on Saturday. The regional ACE holiday party is happening this weekend at Great Wolf Lodge and the park will make a presentation, which traditionally is a discussion of changes occurring for the next year. Also I would not be surprised to see gravity group send a representative. I have been hearing rumors about this project for months. It sounds like it is Gravity Group doing the work and I have heard they are using the engineered track that debuted on Racer this year. More then likely this does mean they will reprofile the sections they are working on. It will likely be similar to the changes to Racer. Scan the existing ride, model it in modern design software and clean up the track location with small tweaks to improve the ride without changing the overall design too much. This sounds slightly more then a couple of inch nudge but I expect at the same time the ride will still look and feel mostly the same just smoother. I have also heard rumors that something slightly out of the ordinary is going on with The Beast trains this winter. Before anyone jumps to a conclusion, whatever crazy thing your thinking of, is likely wrong.

Rule 901:9-1-01 (C)(1) https://codes.ohio.gov/ohio-administrative-code/rule-901:9-1-01 Is there a way around this? I have no idea. I have never visited a scene 75 early January to know if the coasters are operating.

Wicked Twister closed at the same time it has for years, the end of the regular season. It has not operated during Haunt in a long time. Closing when it did is normal for that ride.

The HUSS of old did go out of business, and it did happen like the year after building the topple tower rides, but it was several years before the Dollywood lawsuit. The lawsuit had nothing to do with the bankruptcy. The current HUSS bought the remains of the company in bankruptcy and is the company that Dollywood sued. I believe the only reason Dollywood was even able to sue the company was a service contact between them.

Weight restrictions on water slides are normal and is the typical way parks handle safety. Even the biggest companies can get the design wrong and force tighter restrictions then originally planned. The original design for Punga Racers at Universal Orlando’s Volcano Bay had a 150 lb restriction at one point due to injuries. Since then the slides were rebuilt with a new manufacturer which allowed the park to raise the weight restriction to 300 lbs. Unfortunately since weight determines who can ride safely if a park wants or even needs to enforce these restrictions, riders are stuck with scales.

These types of projects rarely get built. The problem is typically financing. Designing and building is the easy part. Finding the money is difficult. I took a look at the website. The developers do not appear to be putting any money into the project. The design was even paid for by $250k from Middletown. They plan to pay for the project with $1.1 billion in bonds. I am on the fence about this projects chances. This group has successfully built projects in the past. But nothing on a scale even close to the size and expense of this proposal. I suspect they will have a difficult time issuing the bonds.

https://mcusercontent.com/b8edaed9d386fc047dcd5cc35/files/8dd9d8d5-51e1-bd62-238a-34b463c038ff/131_Glenwood_Caverns_HMD_accident_report.pdf Try this link instead. On Orion and many other coasters where the belt is a backup it is an automotive style belt. The belt locks due to sudden movement. You can pull it out slowly, but give it a quick tug and it locks.

Here is the official report. I feel it’s important to point out two different ride ops physically checked the girls belt. The first pulled on the tab confirming it was locked. The ride generated an error even indicated exactly what seat had a problem since the belt never cycled. According to the report this ride operator proceeded to recheck the belts on all of the passengers and attempted to dispatch multiple times (it never says how many times), ignoring the fact the controls told them exactly which seat had an issue. Then a second ride operator arrived, manually unlocked the belts, pulled the belts locking rod out, and immediately reinserted it. All without either noticing the girl was sitting on top of the belts. History time, Lightnin Loops at Six Flags Great Adventure had a death due to a guest being in front of the restraint. This caused Six Flags to change to using orange OTSR restraints on Arrow coasters, and is also the reason loops were added to the front of the restraints. glenwood-caverns-accident-report.pdf

https://www.denverpost.com/2021/09/24/glenwood-caverns-death-child-ride-operator-error/ Well investigators know exactly what happened, and why. Frankly it reminds of the Smiler accident. The operators made mistake after mistake. I get the feeling they had zero clue how to correctly operate the ride and obviously had no idea what to do when they received an error.

The Ohio state Supreme Court ruled on this in 2015. Private police forces in Ohio are subject to open records laws. Makes no difference how they are funded. This includes colleges who were not successful in defending their opinion that they are not required to comply.

The Freedom of Information Act only applies to the parks security because of the fact that they are actually a real police department, the Cedar Point Police Department. They are actual police officers with the ability to arrest individuals, write tickets, etc. They are subject to many of the same standards as regular public police departments and are required to respond to FOIA requests. If the park did not want to be subject to public scrutiny then it would have been as simple as not having an actual police force and instead just being park security. There is no point to waiting for an investigation into the accident to end, or anything else to occur. The only information that can be requested is what is generated by the parks police, which likely has nothing to do with the on going investigation. Their work on the accident was basically done the day of the accident. This kind of work by Newspapers and other media organizations is how investigative journalism is done. You might disagree with this specific case but in the future what happens if they are investigating a serious crime? Oversight of police departments is important and confirming the right for news organizations to have the ability to request documents and information is important. I do not have an issue with having this fight now and confirming the parks responsibilities under the law instead of waiting for something else. Like I said before if the park does not want to have to respond to these types of requests in the future then it just needs to no longer have a real police force. I cannot imagine any decisions about corporate headquarters take into account the local newspaper. I have spoken with people before about why they are located where they are in the chain. I hear a lot about how Cedar Fair is giving people the option of where do they want to be located, the problem is everyone is making the same choice, Charlotte. Jason McClure for instance when he was promoted from general manager of Cedar Point to regional Vice President of a number of parks including Kings Island, Cedar Point, and Carowinds, moved to Charlotte. Honestly I get the feeling that the headquarters in Sandusky is little more than a building and to claim it is in Sandusky. The move while still unofficial has already happened. I do agree that personal details should only be published if the victim or their family consents.

Except this is the papers complaint. That the park is not willing to provide the information that the paper believes it is required to provide under state law and decisions made by the states Supreme Court. Having read the argument the paper is making I actually agree with the paper that the parks security likely will be forced to respond and provide documents and information. I am not sure if what the paper requested is really that important, but from what I can tell the paper is correct and the park appears to be breaking the law. The city would not be involved here and has nothing to do with this. You make Freedom of Information Act requests directly to the agency. In this case that means you request documents directly from the parks security. It reads to me like the park is refusing to respond to those requests and is instructing the paper to talk to the parks lawyers. Which is part of the problem here, none of us know what the parks response has been.

Jersey Devils operations and design is not compatible with Cedar Fairs safety standards. It is impossible for this style of ride to have decent capacity without major design changes or major changes to the chains policies. RailBlazer has a fraction of the capacity of Wonder Woman even though they are the same ride just mirrored.

After seeing a photo of the bracket and having seen where and how it’s believed to attach to the train on pointbuzz, I have an idea on what might have happened. Brackets like that are used to trigger proximity sensors. These types of sensors do not require contact and should never touch the item triggering them. Except you can clearly see scrape marks where it was rubbing against something. It would not take a lot of cycles to cause that though. But it suggests the plate had moved or sensors were out of position. I suspect the issue was with a bolt holding this bracket on this train. I really do not like the plates attachment method. Using two screws means you have a single point of failure. If one screw backs out, breaks, etc the plate suddenly has nothing preventing rotation. Even a slight movement of the plate will cause it to impact other parts of the ride and will likely cause other damage for instance the bracket breaking free. There really should have been 3 screws. This way in the event something does happen to one, maintenance at least has a chance to catch the problem before it becomes catastrophic. You can clearing see scrape marks where it was rubbing against something while the ride was in motion. My guess is something happened to one bolt, allowing the bracket to move. At first the motion was likely minimal and it just rubbed against items during the ride cycle. Then a few cycles later the bracket moved enough it struck something, and you can see a dent, causing the other bolt to break and the piece of steel came completely free and unfortunately it struck a guest.

A little history lesson. Kingda Ka opened with a queue in the rides infield, it was much smaller then the one on TTD and the overflow queue which was not located inside the ride first turned into the temporary queue after an accident which ended up becoming the permanent queue and is still in use today. The original queue did not even last the first season. A few months after the ride opened the launch malfunctioned. The catch car encountered too much resistance due to problems with loose material in the trough in which it travels. This resistance meant that the train was accelerating much slower then it should. The rollback brakes are not controlled by sensors but instead work off of timers. So while it looks like they follow the train down the launch track they raise based on where the train should be but if it’s not in the correct location they can catch up to the train and overtake it. The launch computer at the time was programmed to provide additional power if the train will not gain enough speed to clear the top hat. Not moving fast enough, increase power, still not fast enough, increase power, etc. So the ride raised the brakes, under and in front of the train which immediately slowed the train, causing the launch computer to command more, and more and more power from the launch motor. The magnetic brakes are not designed to withstand the full force of the launch motor. Worst case was supposed to be a roll back, not trying to drag the train through them with a 20,800 horsepower motor. The ride destroyed a number of brake fins, and other parts of the launch. My understanding is the train was damaged and I have no idea how much debris this generated. The state opened an investigation and in the end it was decided that the infield queue would close. I have heard it was the state who forced the queues closure but I am not certain. The ride was closed for a while between the investigation and the fact that many parts are custom made and had to be special ordered from Intamin. The ride even had a launch viewing area basically where the TTD stands are located which also permanently closed. I think Cedar Point will reopen TTD. But I hate to say it’s time for them to learn from Six Flags and move or enclose the queue. Also close the viewing area or add additional barriers between the viewing areas and the launch. I personally think a plexiglass wall which extends several feet over the top of the launch and then angles out over top of the track would be enough.

The footage was not leaked. Ohio state law requires that body cam footage is considered a public record. That means you can use the freedom of information act to request and review body cam footage unless it meets a small list of exceptions. The news organization which posted it requested the footage and they were allowed to examine and record their own copy of the video. If I remember correctly police departments are not required to provide a digital copy, what you see is likely just how they comply with the laws requirements.

Mostly because I dislike random speculation. Here is a compilation of pieces of information that have been discussed on other sites. The park made a statement yesterday not long after the incident which makes it clear that it was a piece of the train. This is from a statement from Tony Clark. Local police scanner listeners have stated that the ambulance requested a helicopter while it was on its way to the hospital. In short they knew they needed to get her to a different hospital. I have not listened to it myself but I believe a copy of the audio is available online. A nurse who was in the line and helped treat the guest until paramedics arrived wrote an incident report for the park. She claims she thought the park would lose it and took a photo of her report and posted it online. I will not post the photo. I do have a copy and it’s not hard to find. The short hand used in the report are consistent with what would normally be found in something written by a medical professional, and people have confirmed the individual who posted the picture is a nurse. Note: Readers might not want to continue to read this. The report in short states that the injury was to the right side of the head and that there was “visible brain matter”.

Sandusky Register here is the latest update. Well the good news is that the woman is alive. That Firelands had to transfer her to another hospital is not good. That suggests to me that the injuries are serious enough that the local regional hospital could not handle it. I have some ideas but not willing to speculate right now.

Reports are the item came off the train in the brake run and the incident is not related to the launch. Right now my best guess is a magnetic brake fin, or something else brake related. While I am not aware of any injuries, there have been cases before where a fin or the train becomes misaligned enough that they strike each other. I could see a fin getting sheared off and being thrown a decent distance. I really hope that the eye witness accounts are wrong because the early reports are claiming the guest was struck in the head. Early reports are frequently found to be wrong, and a lot of what I just posted is based on rumors from people who claim they saw something. So who knows what’s correct.

The park could really use a B&M hyper but with Apollo’s Chariot at BGW it’s going to have to be something special and unique, at least for the area. I have suggested it before but some other park really does needs to do it. A B&M hyper with a dual load station with one side running trains facing forward and one running backwards similar to Hollywood Dream at Universal Studios Japan. It adds complexity and cost with track switches, more queues, staff, a fourth train, etc. But it also basically gives the park two ride experiences at once and USJ actually has different naming for the backwards experience calling it BackDrop. Advertise it as two rides in one and give it two different names.