1 hour ago, JoshuaA said:

In a ideal world next year the park would invest in a identical replacement and maybe spruce up the area while they are at it.

I think that is wishful though, lets hope.. I wouldn't be upset if they re-did Tomb Blaster next year instead as that ride is currently a pile of garbage.

 

I agree with you on this one

 

Proof Varney is actually Thanos.

 

Merlin will never reopen it unless it’s themed to a Donaldson I.P.

to be honest even if they replace it, it will never be as good as buccaneer. For some reason, it always went just that little bit higher then other swinging ships. 

 

Some of my my best memories was during fury’s opening year and just staying on it for ten rides in a row, just switching seats after ever cycle. 

 

??

A shame, and further testament to the lack of maintenance budget provided to the Merlin parks.

 

There's always budget for new investments (albeit smaller and smaller numbers as of late). And they have a bare minimum budget for maintaining attractions (ie: fix stuff so they're safe and that's about it). But if something goes wrong, you're screwed. And with Merlin parks having a good few rides from the 90s, which are now reaching 30 years old, it's only understandable that some rides will need major refurbs.

 

What will be the next ride to bite the maintenance dust..

I'm shocked that Ramases Revenge is still alive, and by god it's tried it's best to be sent to the scrapheap over the years, bless it's cotton socks.

13 minutes ago, MattyMoo said:

I'm shocked that Ramases Revenge is still alive, and by god it's tried it's best to be sent to the scrapheap over the years, bless it's cotton socks.

 

I'm calling it. By the end of next year, it will be on the scrapheap.

Yep - 2020, 25 years and out!

Give it a few years and it’ll just be a zoo again.

 

With a side themed area of Julia Donaldson if we are lucky!

On 5/9/2019 at 10:16 AM, Mark9 said:

 

I'm calling it. By the end of next year, it will be on the scrapheap.

Spoke too soon. Chessington have called an end to Black Buccaneer according to British Theme Park Archive on FB

On 5/9/2019 at 7:13 AM, JoshC. said:

A shame, and further testament to the lack of maintenance budget provided to the Merlin parks.

 

There's always budget for new investments (albeit smaller and smaller numbers as of late). And they have a bare minimum budget for maintaining attractions (ie: fix stuff so they're safe and that's about it). But if something goes wrong, you're screwed. And with Merlin parks having a good few rides from the 90s, which are now reaching 30 years old, it's only understandable that some rides will need major refurbs.

 

What will be the next ride to bite the maintenance dust..

 

 

vampire. that's lasted for years. will be sad when that goes

I think Vampire for now is safe, I don't see the park removing it for another 5 years or so and even then I don't think its too much of a maintenance nightmare (especially now with the vekoma trains.)

I think the next ride to face the Black Buccaneer fate is gonna be Rameses; Its rarely open, not very popular and overall I'm kinda shocked they haven't sent it to the scrapyard yet..

I think Samurai will soon face that same fate.. Merlin really don't like flat rides.. 

 

If Vampire goes the whole park is basically dead. 

 

Its the one ride the park needs to ensure it can function with it’s current operation. 

This is a thread that has primarily been created to tell me if Black is going to sail the high sky of Chessington World Adventures again. But feel free to discuss all things Bucky here.

Can you not just use pre existing threads?

Sorry MarkC I wasn't aware that there was already a thread for this subject.

Black Bucaneer is back according to a tweet from Chessington - but now it's blue!

 

Meanwhile, Thorpe have announced.... well nothing (officially anyway)

Here's the tweet in question:

 

 

So glad to see it's coming back!

I believe that during winter maintenance a major fault was found with the ride which couldn't be repaired. 

 

The park wanted to keep the ride but a replacement ship couldn't be gotten in so quickly, especially as the budget had already been spent elsewhere. So a quiet removal followed by a quiet reintroduction was decided upon.

 

Presumably it'll be of a similar size and scale to Black Buccaneer.

 

**The doubters**

 

Very pleased and surprised it’s (technically) coming back.

1 hour ago, JoshC. said:

I believe that during winter maintenance a major fault was found with the ride which couldn't be repaired. 

My assumption would be that the support beams holding the ride in place had cracks in which weren't repairable. When I worked at Chessington in 2018 it was a problem, hence the repaint to be grey (makes the cracks easier to see), but the ride didn't need to be closed yet.

It had to be removed because ghostbusters were called in during closed season and they established that the constant movement of the ship had disturbed an ancient burial ground.

On 1/27/2020 at 5:52 PM, JoshC. said:

I believe that during winter maintenance a major fault was found with the ride which couldn't be repaired. 

I think theyd known it had age problems for years and they tried their hardest to keep the same ship going until it just couldnt get its certificate. This flogging a dead horse usually means they dont want to spend real money on it and it ends up removed (Skyway, Rameses etc). So it's a fantastic turn around that theyre actually going to get a new ship  now (it seems). I'm sure loads of guests will appreciate it! Good on the park

Chessington nice move. Replacing Buccaneer with a similar ride model, replacing Rameses pretty much right after closing with another decent looking flat ride.

This is how the Merlin parks should deal with closures.. Don't just leave your plots of land derelict (Skyway, Loggers, Slammer. Ripsaw)

If it's going to be renamed, I should say, "Hispaniola", the ship from Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson.

Blue Buccaneer.

 

Someone has probably already said that.