Stealth

[Benin]

I mean this IS the company the used the term "Legs. Gone." with an accompanying picture of Smiler.

[Inferno]

4 hours ago, Jax said:

It's almost as if the marketing team have no idea what's going on at the park.

To be fair they probably work in an office elsewhere, and don’t visit the park as guests that often. They are simply doing their jobs - this post will have been just one of many things they would have been working on at the time.

 

I think of the places I’ve worked over the years, and many of them I haven’t even been a customer of the company 🤷‍♂️ 

 

For all we know this could have been written and scheduled ages ago, or maybe even the people who run this stuff might not even work for Merlin. Social media can be outsourced and work with stock images and key info, like times etc 

[JoshC.]

I don't know who writes those tweets, but they will be scheduled in advance (likely by the month at a minimum, maybe further). 

 

It's not an ideal thing to do when the ride the choose is experiencing extended downtime. I would think it's something they could schedule more on a weekly basis, to avoid such a potential issue.

 

 There is another question to raise, which is why they need to tweet opening times every week. These tweets seem to get minimal views / engagement, suggesting it's not furthering the audience's understanding of opening hours. Just seems a tad unnecessary from the outward perspective. I'm sure they've got reasons behind it backed up with whatever analytics, but yeah, I don't fully get it 

[Jax]

No engineers or operators saying the ride is closed....

Most likely waiting for a part. Rumour has it that it will be closed until early May.

[planenut]

3 hours ago, Jax said:

No engineers or operators saying the ride is closed....

Most likely waiting for a part. Rumour has it that it will be closed until early May.

That's Thursday onwards then, I too am hopeful.

[JoelAllen]

Looks like Stealth was being worked on today by engineers. Hopefully it’ll be back sooner rather than later.

 

Strangely Rita is also closed for extended maintenance at the moment. Neither coasters seem to be having much luck at the moment.

 

I wonder if they’re related?

[Jax]

Interesting that Rita is closed too.... Kingda Ka must have put a hex on it or something lol.

 

Good to see engineers working on Stealth today as you mentioned, maybe the part has arrived that they need, and hopefully it's opens sooner.

[Jax]

 

Relatively promising post from Thorpe on X yesterday....

Could Stealth be back soon?

[JoelAllen]

Looks like fastrack tickets have been taken off sale from today to the 8th May. I am going on the 6th! Typical

[Jax]

Does this mean it'll be back on the 8th?

[Cal]

1 hour ago, Jax said:

Does this mean it'll be back on the 8th?

No, they aren’t even selling FastTrack for most coasters tomorrow or the weekend. 
 

They can add/remove FastTrack allocation at any time so I wouldn’t look too much into it. 
 

They normally update ‘one shot’ FastTrack availability daily. 

[Jax]

Ahhh I see.... important to note that Stealth is listed as "Closed" instead of "Closed All Day" or "Closed Today" so maybe its back soon.

 

Has there been any action? I know the park was closed a couple days ago so maybe that gave them a chance to try and get it going again....

[planenut]

Some parts have to be made, some decisions too. If the parts are very expensive it will not be paid for from the standard budget.

 

The fix is getting closer, no doubt.

[Jax]

Anymore news from the park today?

[JoelAllen]

Looks like the fastrack button on the app has completely disappeared now. Rita at Alton Towers has also been closed a week. I'm keeping an eye on Stealth... I'm going on Tuesday, but hopefully will have a return trip when Stealth is back open

[JoshC.]

I don't believe Stealth and Rita's closures are related, although that is little more than a hunch right now. 

 

If there's an update, I'm sure it'll be shared quickly, but for now all we can assume is it is still waiting for either a part or advice from Intamin. 

[Jax]

Let's hope it opens soon.

 

Planning on going next week, so I am too hopeful.

[Dylsbrim]

Anyone know what happened?? All I have heard is the train only went half way up the top hat, rolled back and been closed since. Anyone know if this is true?

 

I am getting concerned for stealth now guys. I really hope if Rita closes they salvage the parts and do everything to keep stealth open. Imagine Rita trains on the stealth circuit. That is if they repainted them back to Rita original colours but would still be so cool to see. Anyone reckon that's possible? I fear stealth only has a season or two left depending on operations for the rest of this season. It's literally gone silent. What if this issue continues to occur. 

[Benin]

It ALWAYS goes silent when there's a long term closure. 

 

See Hyperia last year. 

 

It is not within the best interests of the park(s) to announce publicly any technical issues with the rides. 

 

Aren't Rita & Stealth trains the same?

 

Just likely that the hydraulic launched coasters have a bit of a shorter lifespan. Presumably down to the launch system itself being incredibly high energy for short bursts of time so wear and tear is bound to happen. Fairly telling with there being only 10 Intamin ones operating with the last brand new one built in 2010. 

[Inferno]

Yeah I don’t think the lack of news is anything to be too worried about at the moment.  It’s quite normal isn’t it for this to happen when things break.

 

I do think however that we should all make a conscious effort to regularly get on Stealth going forward and appreciate it.  We have seen a lot of rides around the world close out of the blue recently, and with Stealth being what it is, I suspect that one day something will happen that might force their hand in to making a decision perhaps.

 

Stealth is actually something quite special now. A launch like that has become rare! We are lucky to have it just down the road.

[Mark9]

I don't think there's a reason to panic at this point. Both Rita and Stealth being long term closed at the same time is a pretty wild coincidence. But the thing for me is that over the last three years both Formula Rossa and Xcelerator spent months and months closed only to return and still operate so Stealth could easily just reopen this month with no fanfare. 

 

I think this is just a problem with the accelerator model which is why we're actually down to 9 operating models now (Skycar has been SBNO since last August). I do agree with Inferno, enjoy our rides on Stealth whilst we can.

[JoshC.]

I've had my suspicions all but confirmed in that Stealth's and Rita's are indeed unrelated.

 

Thorpe will do their utmost to keep Stealth going, and I don't think we're anywhere near the point where they're considering getting rid of it.

 

For those old enough to remember, Thorpe literally clung onto dear life with Slammer. It was closed more than it was open for a couple of years. S&S stopped manufacturing parts, so Thorpe sourced things elsewhere. They dedicated a lot of money and man hours into getting the thing running. Only once it had absolutely gone past the financial point of no return did they give up the ghost.

 

And Stealth is obviously different; it is still such an iconic ride for the park, is a genuine reason that people visit, and generates money from merch sales.

 

I'm not saying to take Stealth for granted, but at this point, there is no reason to think Stealth is facing an imminent closure in the next couple of years.

[Jax]

So, Stealth is suspected to be an issue with the launch mechanism, which is difficult to fix since Intamin discontinued it and stopped support on existing accelerators. It is a very difficult issue for them to repair without the help of Intamin so Stealth could be a lot longer closure. Keep in mind I got this from a friend who knows maintenance staff.

 

With Rita, the issues is with the catch car rather than the main launch system. Rita is expected to be open within the next week or two.

 

To summarise, Rita most likely 1-2 weeks closure. Stealth I’d imagine will be later in the month, so opening for the latter I’d estimate to be, like 16th May onwards from the information I have, KEEP IN MIND THIS COULD CHANGE.

[Marc]

Agree with the posts that there’s nothing to worry about as such.

 

As for intamin supporting it I wouldn’t be surprised if the help offered if more limited now but I’d be surprised if they got no help at all. Merlin also have 3 of these coasters so I expect the internal knowledge of them is very strong. It seems they are actively working on it so hopefully will see it back up and running soon.