John Smith

It was closed for the first 10 days of the main season too was it not? Stealth and Slammer both failed to open until mid to late March. As well as this it has been closed for large parts of several days.And I visited Thrill Chill twice and that was enough for me!

If only Saw had been a vertical drop, opposed to the "beyond vertical" drop, it would have given the same feeling as Oblivion.But Saw was all about getting headlines unfortunately, not to create a coaster that would continue to thrill or excite for years to come... The theming is the best bit, and we all know that in 3 or 4 years none of it will work! Whereas Oblivion is pure class, and a coaster that won't ever stop thrilling.I've not been to Alton Towers very much because it's so far away, but Oblivion was easilly the best ride at the park. And Alton Towers is a brilliant theme park.

I think it had the re-paint during the down-time it experienced a couple of weeks ago now.It's just the fence that's been repainted though- to me it looks like Samurai's pods have just been properly cleaned, but I may be wrong on this one.It looks a lot nicer now though, and it's good that Thorpe have done it, whereas in previous years they probably wouldn't have bothered.

Has anyone noticed that Samurai has been cleaned? (Well, the pods have, the main arm hasn't).It looks a lot nicer without the nasty stains all over it.And the fence has been given a fresh lick of paint (or a really good clean).It must have been quickly done in the down-time it recently had, but it looks nicer.

Ahh, you're also on Thorpe Park mania!I got those averages off SP(I hope you didn't mind). Keep up the interesting posts!

Slammer has only not been down twice in around 8 or 9 visits this season.Excellent.

I came across this info from another forum and thought I'd post it on here regarding differing heights between the two swings. Compliments to "Neilfever" on SP for this, and please delete if not allowed."Here is an average of the swing angles Rush makes during a ride cycle, note swing A is the one nearest the ride console."SWING A032-4759-8186-100101-104104-6335-1280SWING B033-4759-8085-9579-7092-5528-50So it's actually quite a big and noticable difference between the two- almost 10 degrees on Max. height...

Rush at 10 minutes!?I queued 70 minutes for it, and that was at about 12, when it had only been open half an hour or so.Being on one swing, and with fasttrack being allowed on, only about 10 people were being allowed on from the main queue each time. Tbh, they shouldn't operate fast-track when it's on reduced capacity, much like they haven't with Saw.

Rush was on only one swing yesterday, making the queue ridiculous. Still had to give it a go again though. The swing open was the one that normally swings lower, however without the other swing turned on, it goes to the height it's actually supposed to. I wonder why...?

Saw bored me after the first couple of rides.Stealth still doesn't bore me after what has probably been hundreds.

I know that loads of people have and will probably say the same thing, but go for it!Trust me, it's a brilliant ride, and once you do it once, you'll want to do it over and over again. :PThere're far more "scary" rides at Thorpe than Stealth..

Thank you for taking the time to do that.

On Sunday I noticed that there were a few new tracks to Loggers Leap. Does anyone have the entire track listing for L-L as of 2009 season? (I have the 2008 collection- or think I have them all)

Well, for some reason this season, the queue line board can't go into 3 digits, basically meaning that it can't go above 99 minutes. So even if the queue was actually 2 hours, the board still says 99 minutes... It's a bit ridiculous really. Saw's queue board can go into 3 digits, and it's a good job really!

Well, Stealth stayed at 0 minutes until about half 10 ish, but there weren't any serious queues until after lunch over that side of the park. Literally, you could walk straight onto a train without stopping over and over again. :blink:Queue times peaked over on the Amity side of the park at around 1-2ish.I find Nemesis boring, but I can only assume that it also had no queue until the same sort of times. As far as I'm aware Nemesis peaked at 40 minutes (at about 2 ish) which really isn't bad...As a contrast, Colossus was at 99 minutes for a good part of the day, just because it's close to Saw!

Right.. trip report for today!Got to Thorpe for about quarter of an hour after opening, and went straight over to Stealth. It was dead over this side of the park and Stealth was a walk on for around an hour (hence why we stayed there for about an hour), included two "pole position" seats. :blink:Next was Rumba, again with no queue. It really hacks me off that they've removed the waterfall effect. They've actually physically removed the rock, so it won't be coming back. :PNext, over to Rush, and this is when the queues really started- Saw side of the park was ridiculously busy.Next Quantum :DThen Loggers Leap twice and Canada Creek railway.The lunch at Sainsburys in Staines (you don't get completely ripped off there).After lunch we did Loggers Leap another time, along with Rocky Express (Ryan is a wonderful ride host!)By this point (about 2ish), the rides were getting really really busy- there was even a huge queue for Slammer, which never happens. Queued 25 mins for Stealth, including a break down, and again at the front. But once we'd gotten off Stealth the queue had rocketed up to 70 mins. We just took it easy for a couple of hours going on all the rather tame rides, but rides with no queues, and finished with Colossus, 3 more Loggers Leap rounds, and Saw (which they keep open until dead on 6, meaning we didn't actually get on the ride until 7).Seriously, if you're planning a trip to Thorpe in the near future, do not go anywhere near Saw at the start of the day- stay over Amity Cove way and you won't go wrong. For the first few hours you will pretty much have that side of the park to yourself, and really, Saw's pretty mediocre at best and certainly not worth a 3 hour wait which it was today. If you want Saw then queue for it right at the end of the day. Also, if you run our of money for whatever reason, go on Loggers, because there is ALWAYS money lying in the boat at the front! :PGreat day, and no dissappointments at all! (WOW!)Ride Count:Stealth: 6- ish?Saw: 1Rumba: 1Loggers Leap: 6Canada Creek RW: 1Colossus: 1Rush: 1Quantum: 2Rocky Express: 2Sainsburys: 1I think that's it...Longest queue of the day: 1 hour and 10 mins for Saw.Shortest: 0 mins

Actually, two people were in the pod. It didn't fall off, it only partially detached.Link HEREBut it would scare the absolute hell out of everyone involved!

I guess there was always the incident involving the old enterprise at Thorpe...Oh and Rush. But I personally feel slightly less safe at a funfair than in an established park.

It is a really good ride- really thrilling and scary, especially the one at Brighton seeing as it swings out over the sea.But yeah, two people were killed, and two injured when one of the pods fell off.Here's a link, HERE. I did see a video somewhere of the French news showing the people on the other pod being cut out of the ride but I couldn't find it again. They must have been ever so slightly thankful that they weren't on the other one.I guess travelling fairs and such like don't have the safety requirements that actual theme parks have, meaning things like this'll happen from time to time..

According to Wikipedia, it was relocated to Six Flags New England in 2006, and although wikipedia is hardly the fountain of all knowledge, Catapult is listed on the six flags website as operational.Although this is now majorly off-topic, was S&S Sky Swat a bit of a failure, in terms of popularity and numbers sold?

I never bothered with Super Booster, but have done "normal" Booster a few times. Super Booster, for £8 for one ride, just seems like a huge waste..But yeah, Booster, it's not the restraints that make me feel unsafe, its the whole ride! Especially when a couple of people have died on them. :/It is a fantastic ride though, it must be said.

Yeah, but skyhawk works properly when compared with Rush.Rush was a prototype yes, and it did have many problems in it's first year, however, the number of down days have now dropped significantly.But it still doesn't explain why one swing clearly has something wrong with it- and when looking at Rush, particularly from a distance, the difference in height at times between the two must be approaching 20 degrees!One side is like it should be- see the previous picture of Skyhawk; and the other one just about makes it to being horizontal.

Does anybody agree with me that Dolly Parton makes Canada Creek that little bit more awesome?Why'd you come in here looking like that, in your high heeled boots and your painted on jeans?All decked out like a cow-girls dreams.

I've said this before, but Rush is still not working as it should, and I haven't seen Rush actually in sync. since the season before last!Just why is it so bad? Yesterday it was really noticeable.Is it swing B that goes a lot lower than swing A, or the other way round? Either way, you can really tell the difference between the two and it's annoying as hell when you get the bad one.Using physics and the pendulum theory, even if one swing goes higher than the other, if there are no other external factors at play, they should still remain in sync. because their mass is approximately the same/ gravity is acting on them both equally. At least I think that should be right. So there must be something actually wrong with the ride itself (the only obvious thing I can think of is that there is a lot more friction in the moving parts on one than the other? ) I don't know, but it annoys me having seen it not working properly for all this time, and seemingly nothing's been done...It is still my favourite ride (so long as you get the good side) so I want to see them caring for Rush more! :PTake a look at some youtube videos of Skyhawk at Cedar Point. It's near as damn it to in sync, and both swings go to the same height. That's how Rush should be!

The first time you go on Rush, the restraints do make you think".. err.. is this safe?"But after God knows how many times going on it you realise that it is the fact that their is so little holding you in that makes it so exciting.You can always tell if someone hasn't been on Rush before- they can be seen pushing the lap bar down before the op. has locked them, and looking anxious as it pops back up again and again. B)Of course all of us know that when you hear that lovely hiss sound, the bars are locked.